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THE 



PEOGEESS 




OP 



BAPTIST PRINCIPLES 



IN 



THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS. 



THOMAS r: CURTIS, 

PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY AT LEWISBURG, PA., 
AND AUTHOR OF "COMMUNION," ETC. ETC. 






vp; 



'-^J^/^^WASV^S^^'^ 



BOSTON: 
aOUT. E> AND LINCOLN, 

50 WASHINGTON STREET. 

NEW YORK: SHELDON, LAMPORT & BLAKEMAN, 

115 NASSAU STREET. 

1855. 







Entered according to Act of Congress, in the 3^ear 1855, by 

GOULD & LINCOLN, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Massachusetts. 



i 



PREFACE. 



This volume miglit almost be called ^' Concessions 
of Pedobaptists as to the Errors of Infant Baptism^ 
and the Importance of Baptist Principles," The aim 
of the writer has chiefly been to arrange these authori- 
tieSj and point out the consequences of their admis- 
sions. He has for a few years occasionally noted down 
some of the more striking of these acknowledgments, 
as he has casually met with them in the course of his 
theological reading. Each year these have become 
more distinct and decisive^ when fairly put together, 
so that no system of Pedobaptism can now be pro- 
duced consistent with itself. A body of concessions so 
complete and overwhelming at every point, could not 
be brought forward in regard to any other practice yet 
maintained by such large bodies of excellent Christians 
as still uphold infant baptism. 

It would have been easy to double the number of 
these admissions, and the authorities adduced on every 
point. Indeed the recollection of most students will 
at each step suggest several important additional testi- 
monies of a similar kind. Tlie object of the author 



lY PKEFACE. 

has "been to select none but what were easily accessible, 
and are, or ought to be, well known to every impartial 
thinker. To the writer they appear as decisive as tes- 
timony can be in regard to any thing. 

If, in a single line of the following pages, there 
should appear to the reader the slightest unkind allu- 
sion to any other denomination or individual, the writer 
would at once say that nothing has been further from 
his intentions or his feelings. For his Christian breth- 
ren of different denominations he has ever cherished the 
most fraternal regard, and wishes increasingly to pro- 
mote every thing that may tend to cultivate and 
strengthen this sentiment. But he is persuaded that 
this is not to be done by diminishing denominational 
attachments, or the closeness of Church ties — not by 
an increase of laxity ^ but of love. 

His aim has been to draw a wide distinction between 
parties and opinions. Hence the object of this volume 
is not to exhibit or defend the Baptists, but their prin- 
ciples. So, on the other hand, the author has not 
intentionally made an unkind allusion to any Pedobap- 
tist denomination, or a single person, while conscien- 
tiously maintaining an opposite system. 

Philadelphia, September 1, 1855. 



C ONTENTS 



PAGE 

Preface iii 

Introduction -^iji 



BOOK ONE. 

PROaRESS OF PRmCIPLES NOW CONCEDED m THEORY BY 
THE MOST ENLIGHTENED OF OTHER DENOMINATIONS. 



CHAPTER I. 
OPENiNa Remarks 



15 



CHAPTER II. 

Freedom of Conscien-ge, and Separation of Church and State 18 
Section I— Earlier Developments of the Principle of Re- 
ligious Liberty 20 

YiEWS OF THE DoNATISTS 21 

" THE WaLDENSES. . , , 21: 

*' THE MeNNONITES ^ 30 

" THE PeDOBAPTIST REFORMED DENOMINATIONS 31 

" British Baptists, 15G0-<1G10 33 

" Roger Williams 37 

** Lord Baltimore. . , 4q 

" William Penn 42 

" The New England Puritans 46 



vi CONTEXTS. 

PAGE 

Section II.— Progsess in the last Hundred Ye^^rs 47 

Exa:jple of Ehode Island and Pennsylvania 48 

Church Establishment in Virginia 49 

" IN Massachusetts , 52 

Massachusetts Proyls-cial Congress 54 

Liberty of Conscience in North-west Territory 56 

United States Constitution Amended 56 

Influence of the Principles of the United States 58 

These Prjnciples in Englant) 58 

" IN Europe 59 

" IN Turkey 59 

" IN China 60 

CHAPTER III. 

A Converted Church Membership 60 

Difference between American and European Ideas 61 

Progress among Roman Catholics 61 

" Episcopalians 62 

^' German Reformed Churches 63 

Opinions One Hundred Years ago in America 64 

The Methodists 65 

The Presbyterians 66 

The Congregationaltsts 68 

Progress in Europe 71 



CHAPTER lY. 

Sacraments Inoperative without Choice and Faith 13 

Ordinances Vitalized by Faith '74 

Sacramentalism is- G-erman Reformed Churches H 

" in Episcopal Churches 75 

" IN Melville's Sermons 75 

" in John Wesley 76 

" m Dr. ISTevin^ 77 

Views of the Congregationalists 78 

Baptist View. 79 

Concessions of North British Review SO 

Admitted Unscripturalness op In^^ant Baptism 81 

Infant Baptism the main reliance of Puseyism S3 



oonte:n^ts. vu 



CHAPTER V. 

Believers the only Scriptueal Subjects of Baptism 85 

Section I. — Baptist Yiew stated 86 

Section II. — Infant Baptism admitted Bt Pedobaptists Unscrip- 

tural. 81 

(a.) Sponsorship admitted of no Authority 88 

(&.) No Precept or Example for it 89 

(c.) Abrahamic Covenant no Authority 90 

(d) Household Baptisms no Authority , , 93 

(e.) Matthew, xix. 14, no Authority 95 

(/.) 1 Cor. vil 14 proves Infant Baptism Unknown. 96 

(g,) Proselyte Baptism no Authority 98 

Section HI. — Church History admitted to Confirm the above 

Yiew 99 

(a.) The Cause of its Silence as to Infant Baptism 99 

G-ale and Wall 100 

Coleridge 102 

Neander 102 

BUNSEN. . . ; 104 

North British Review lOY 

(&.) The Catechumenical System Decisive 108 

AuausTi 114 

BUNSEN 114 

Neander 11 G 

Apostolic Constitution 117 

Section IY. — The Eise of Infant Baptism Traced by Pedobaptists 117 
Justin Martyr Ignorant of it 110 

iRENiEUS 119 

Tertullian 121 

OriGen 122 

Cyprian 123 

Superstitious Reverence for Ordinances 124 

Section Y. — The Decrease of Infant Baptism 128 

In Europe 128 

Increase of Baptists in United States 129 

Methodists Relinquishing Infant Baptism 130 

Infant Baptism among Episcopalians 131 

Congregationalists abandoning Infant Baptism 131 

Presbyterian Decline in it 133 

Proportion of Infant Baptisms to Births in U. S 136 



Vlll CONTENTS, 



CHAPTER VI. 

iMiTERSIOX ALTTAYS THE BaPTIS:^ OP THE NeW TESTAMENT 137 

Bishop Smith of Kentucky 137 

Dr. Anthon, Dr. Ca:mpbell, Ecclesiastical Historians, G-ermaxN- 
Critics, the GtReek Church, Roman Catholics 138 



BOOK TWO, 

PEOGRESS OF PRUSTCIPLES STILL CONTROVERTED. 

CHAPTER I. 

The Command to Baptize a Command to Immerse 141 

Section I. — Ordinary Meaning of BaKrl^o) 141 

Common Usage fixes the Force of a Command. Il- 
lustration 143 

Ernesti's Rules 146 

Dr. Pond's Mistake 146 

Customary Meaning of BaTrri^co 149 

Section II. — Force of the Prepositions 152 

Meanings of " in" and " into" 152 

clg AND Professor Stuart's Rule 153 

e^ 156 

Section III — Circumstances 159 

(a.) Objections, Accommodations for Immersion at 

Jerusalem 160 

Time required for Immersion 161 

Baptism of the Jailor 163 

(5.) Circumstances requiring Immersion 164 

Section IY. — Figurative Allusions to Baptism 166 

1 Corinthians, x. 2 166 

1 Peter, in. 20, 21 167 

Hebrews, x. 22 163 

Luke, xil 50 168 

Romans, yl 4 169 



COISTTENTS. IX 

PAGE 

Section V. — Historical Yiew ITl 

Section VI. — BaTrrl^fj always inyolves Immersion 175 

Proper and Tropical Use of Words 115 

(a.) Classical Usage Ill 

(6.) New Testament Usage 183 

as to the Baptismal Rite 1S5 

IN the two other cases 18t 

IN the three cases of BaTTTCGfiog 192 

(c.) Septuagint Usage 195 

(d.) Usage in the Apocrypha 196 

Concluding Illustration 200 



CHAPTER II. 

The Importance op Believer's Baptism 202 

Section I. — GtEneral Remarks 202 

Clinic Baptism 206 

Section II. — The Teachings of Baptism 209 

(a.) Submission to the Religion of New Testament.. 209 

Conversion of a French Infidel 209 

(&.) Allegiance to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost 213 

(c.) The Outlines op the Evangelical System 

Baptism of a Universalist 218 

Section III. — The Pledges made in Baptism 221 

(a,) Separation from the "World 221 

(&.) Open Avowal op Religious Principle 222 

(c.) The Pledge Reciprocal and Divine 223 

(d) Embracing a Glorious Resurrection 223 

Section IV. — ^Baptism Important for its Effects 226 

The Church a liiGHT-nousE 229 



CHAPTER III. 

Infant Baptism Injurious — its Modern Defenses Considered. 233 
Section I. — Coleridoe's Defense of Infant Baptism 234 

Discretionary Power of the Cnuucii i':>5 

1# 



X CONTENTS. 

PAOE 

"What is ''the Church?" 236 

Infant Baptism a Change of the Constitution 239 

Constitution of Episcopal Church 240 

Purposes at first Blended 242 

Intolerable View of God 245 

Section IT. — Dr. Bushnell's Defense of it Considered 246 

No settled Congregational Theory 247 

Evangelical Church all Baptist in Theory 248 

Edward's Theory Misunderstood 250 

Dr. Bushnell's Theory — Organic Connection 253 

The Baptist Theory — Sensible Experience 254 

Presumptions of Infant Baptism 256 

Dr. Bushnell's History of Theories 259 

^'Dangerous Tendencies" 262 

Baptist Theory more Natural 26t 

Section III. — Cheyalier Bunsen's Defense 270 

Eeforming the Bible 271 

The Ratification of a Nullity 274 

Section TV. — North British Review 282 

Reforming Biblical Interpretation 284 



CHAPTER IV. 

Open Communion Unwise and Injurious 285 

Dr. Bunsen's Idea 286 

Coincides with R. Hall 287 

History of the Question in England 288 

" " " IN THIS Country 290 

Its present Practical Aspect 291 

YiEws of other Denomd^ations 293 

Inexpedient 294 

A Breach of Trust. 296 

The Ordinances Committed to the Churches 297 

Not to a Visible Church Universal * 301 

Voluntary Alliances not Churches 305 

Churches the sole Guardians 307 

" Aggressive Bodies , 307 

" MUST, therefore, BE UNITED 308 



CONTENTS. X] 

BOOK THREE. 

PKOGRESS OF PRINCIPLES ALWAYS HELD BY EVANGEL- 
ICAL CHRISTIilNS, BUT MOKE CONSISTENTLY BY BAP- 
TISTS. 



CHAPTER I. 



PAGE 



The Sufficiency of Holy Scriptuee 312 

Position of other Denominations 313 

Of the Baptists 318 

Effects as to Missions 319 

In the Translation and Circulation op the Bible 325 



CHAPTER II. 
Saltation by GtRAce alone 329 

CHAPTER III. 

The Essential Priesthood op all Christians 336 

CHAPTER IV. 

Connection of Baptist Principles and Political Liberty 34t 

CONCLUDING CHAPTER. 

Summary of the FOREGoma Work 365 

Reasons why it is Written 366 

(1.) Due to Historical Truth 367 

(2.) Modern Attacks on Evangelical Christianity 368 

(3.) The Difficulties of Evangelical Pedobaptists 369 

(4.) The Condition of the Baptists 3*74 

(5.) The Relative Positions and Approaches op Parties. . 380 



XIJ CONTENTS. 

APPENDIX A. PAGE 

Statistics of the Presbyterian Church 387 

APPENDIX B. 
Professor Hodge's Way of Life 388 

APPENDIX 0. 

Ox THE PORCE OF THE DaTIYE AKD PrEPOSITIOXS IN CONNECTION 

WITH BaTCTc^G) 390 

APPENDIX D. 
On Romans, yi. 4, and Colossians, ii. 12 39G 

APPENDIX E. 
The Misconceptions of Open Communion 40 1 

APPENDIX F. 

Robert Hall on the American "War of Independence 409 



i 



INTEODUCTION 



By many persons. Baptists, are supposed to differ from 
other evangelical Christians merely in relation to two 
points of a single rite — the form and thne of baptism. 
Hence, even where believed to be correct in their opin- 
ions, they are supposed to be wrong in spirit, lacking in 
charity, building up a sect upon a ceremony, and mak- 
ing every other Christian '' an offender for a word." 

Those who have fairly examined their history, how- 
ever, will have observed that they have uniformly main- 
tained a body of principles of which their bajDtism has 
been merely the appointed symbol. Some of these tliey 
have held alone, and others frequently in common with 
(/liristians of different denominations. 



XIV Iiq^TKODUCTIOX. 

The present Trork is intended to trace out the pro- 
gress of Baptist principles during the last hundred years^ 
their coherence and consistency. 

These princij^les may be di^aded uito three classes. 

I. Those which hare been by degrees conceded in 
theory by many of the most enlightened of other de- 
nominations. 

II. Those which form the remaining points still con- 
troverted. 

III. Those which, though always held in common by 
evangehcal Christians, require the acknowledgment of 
Baptist principles, to be advocated with due force and 
consistency. 



BOOK I. 

CONCEDED PRINCIPLES. 

Many of the most important facts and principles as- 
serted by the Baptists, have, within the last hundred years, 
by degrees been fully conceded in theory by several of the 
wisest and best of other denominations. 

. These will be found to form such a basis of concessions 
as to leave it impossible that opposite principles should long 
survive among enlightened evangelical Christians. They 
embrace, 

1. Freedom of Conscience, and the entire separation of 
Church and State. 

2. A Converted Church Membership. 

3. Sacraments inoperative without Choice and Faith. 

4. Believers the only Scriptural Subjects of Baptism. 

5. Immersion always the Baptism of the New Testament. 



CHAPTER I. 

OPENINa REMARKS. 



A Pedobaptist gentleman in Philadelphia has for some 
years been making a collection of all works on the Baptis- 
mal Controversy. He has already obtained more than four- 



16 OPENi:NrG REMARKS. 

teen hundred volumes in the English language alone, which 
he proposes to arrange chronologically, and to present to 
the library of Princeton Theological Seminary. In examin- 
ing this collection, two things are specially noticeable : that 
this controversy has of late years been conducted in a far 
more Christian sphit, and that the pouits of difference are 
greatly narrowed do^\Ti. 

Two hundred years ago, when Dr. Featley published his 
" Dippers Dipped, or the Anabaptists Ducked and Plunged 
Head over Ears," the opponents of Baptist ^dews complained 
on exactly the opposite grounds fi'om what they do now, re- 
garduig them as so radically different that they could not 
safely be even tolerated. There seemed to them something 
that cut at the root of all Christianity, in contending for 
liberty of conscience, den}Ting baptism to mfants, and call- 
mg in question the utility of a vicarious faith by sponsors 
and parents. Fines, fetters, and banishment alone appeared 
the suitable rew^ard for such opinions. Now, on the con- 
trary, it is the chief complaint of evangelical Pedobaptists 
that the difference is so unimportant as not to justify Bap- 
tists m mamtainmg then- peculiarities as a distinct denomi- 
nation. A great change has taken place among Protestants 
generally, and evangehcal Protestants especially. Time has 
killed many of their errors, and more of their prejudices. 
No one knows where they have gone, or how they have 
evaporated. Chevalier Bunsen,^ for instance, " does not 
see for what good internal reason the Baptists, as such, 
can be excluded from a National Church, Those w^ho give 
a preference to adult baj^tism * * * should no more be 
looked upon as heretics on that account than Baptists on 
tlieir part should stigmatize by that name such congrega- 
1 HippolytuS; vol iii. p. 215. 



OPENIJSTG KEMARKS. 17 

tions as have a preference for infant baptism." Disbeliev- 
ing in a National Church, Baptists may not be able to see 
the advantage of suddenly doing away distmctions that 
have so long been matters of historical fact and growth ; 
but they earnestly desire to see all those who love the 
Saviour united in heart, and lovmg each other as fellow- 
heirs of eternal life. 

The degree to which the points of this controversy have 
narrowed down is still more remarkable. It has only been 
by slow stages that those evangehcal truths which were 
the essence of the Reformation, however sincerely held by 
a few of the more prominent Reformers, penetrated into 
the religious life of the masses, or have been carried out to 
their legitimate results. In many cases there was at first 
but a chaos of confused principles. Often where the heart 
was evangelical, many of the remains of Popery hung about 
it, as a fog will linger on the surface of the waters, while at 
a little elevation all is clear. It may not impede the current 
or the tide, or the motion of the vessels borne upon the 
surface, but prevents the navigators from seeing where they 
are going, or pursuing an undeviating course with certainty 
and safety. The clearness and consistency of Baptist prin- 
ciples have enabled those who have held them to penetrate 
these vapors with precision and ease, as a ship guided by a 
well-adjusted compass sails through a mist at sea. But then 
the directness with which they have advanced to their 
point has seemed to others not only dangerous to tliem, but 
to all around. By degrees these fogs have been clearing 
away. Vast multitudes of the most pious men of the age, 
many of them Pedobaptists in name, have become what 
Dr. Bushnell calls " Baptists in theory," to such an extent 
that they ought, as he admits, in all consistency to become 



18 FREEDOM OF C NSCIE:N^CE. 

SO in practice. A careful examination vrill fully show that 
there is a series of principles of which the Baptist denomi- 
nation alone has been the consistent and uniform advocate ; 
principles of the utmost importance to vital religion, and 
now admitted and contended for by none more strenuously 
than those who have most opposed this denomination in 
name. There is nothmg w^hich wdll be more likely to sur- 
prise the student of the ecclesiastical history of this country, 
than to notice that many of the points w^hich were m dispute 
a hundred years ago, and Avhich were originally regarded 
as Baptist peculiarities, have become estabhshed principles 
of the great nnw^ritten creed — the general religious senti- 
ment of the w^hole country — tlie common law, so to speak, 
of American Christianity. It is probable that w^hen some 
of them are named, the only astonishment and difficulty 
Mdth many readers wdU be to realize that these things ever 
were disputed or even doubted. As a first illustration of 
this, w^e may name Freedom of Conscience. 



CHAPTEE II. 

FREEDOM OP CONSCIENCE, AND THE PERFECT SEPARATION OP 
CHURCH AND STATE. 

Two pomts which, superficially ^aew^ed, may seem distinct, 
are here connected together, because they wdU be found to 
resolve themselves essentially into one great principle. T]ie 
utmost distmction is, that the union of Church and State 
puts a premium upon one form of rehgion, while all other 
opposition to freedom of conscience places a penalty upon 
another. But as in the former case the Church w^hich is 



THE DOiS^ATISTS. 19 

established receives a premium from the dissenter, its miion 
with the State involves, in fact, a stigma, a penalty on all 
other forms of worship, and this being compulsory, is per- 
secution. Freedom of conscience can not be fully and 
fairly predicated where any penalty is attached to its ex- 
ercise. 

Of the millions of all denominations in this country, who 
now enjoy so perfectly as we do the inestunable blessing 
of rehgious liberty, and of all those who throughout Europe 
and the world are advocating it in various degrees, few are 
aware how much they are indebted for these views and 
enjoyments to the Baptists ; fewer still know that this 
indebtedness, such as it is, is not mere accident, but a neces- 
sary consequence of their distinctive pecuharities as a de- 
nomination. They may probably have learned from Ban- 
croft that Roger WilHams was the first Christian legislator 
who mtroduced perfect religious hberty into the constitution 
of any State, but are not aware, perhaps, that these views 
were advocated publicly in London by the Baptists, with 
great zeal, a few years before he came to this country. Or 
if prepared to go so far, they are probably ignorant that 
the advocacy of this spiritual freedom is to be traced in 
connection with Baptist sentiments, long before the time of 
Luther, among the Waldenses, and through such men as 
Arnold of Brescia, Peter de Bruis, and the Henricians, back 
probably to the Donatists, and the time of Constantino the 
Great. 

Before, then, commencing to trace the progress of these 
views during the past century, it will be necessary in this 
instance to give a rapid sketch of their previous history, in 
order to show how far they may be fairly and justly claimed 
as distinctively Baptist principles. 



20 THE DOXATISTS. 

§ I. Early Development of the pRixcrPLE of Eeligious Liberty. 

Previous to about the time of Constantine, there could, 
of course, be no controversy on this subject. THe Greeks 
and Romans, though generally tolerant of the rehgion of 
otliers, and not attempting to change the faith of any con- 
quered State, never doubted the right of government to 
interfere, or the wisdom of the exercise of this right on 
occasions. Thus Socrates was condemned to the cup of 
hemlock, on the charge of alienatmg the minds of the young 
from the religion of the State, and it is painful to note the 
indifference ^ith which the mild and philosophic Pliny wiites 
to the Emperor Trajan of the cruel and extensive punish- 
ments he thought proper to inflict upon the "harmless" 
early Christians. Until the time of the first so-called Chris- 
tian emperor, therefore, these men were often persecuted, 
but never had possessed the power of the State on their 
side, either for persecution or for patronage. But no sooner 
was Christianity the religion of the State, and its powers 
employed m crushing the Donatists, than the rights of con- 
science were asserted by the oppressed mmority with great 
eloquence and power. In this respect, Xeander considers 
it " the most imj^ortant and influential Chm*ch division of 
this joeriod." " That which distmguishes the present case is," 
he says, " the reaction proceeding out of the essence of the 
Christian Church against the confounding of the ecclesias- 
tical and pohtical elements, on which occasion, for the first 
time, the ideas which Christianity, as opposed to the pagan 
religion of the State, had first made men distinctly con- 
scious of, became an object of contention within the State 
itself, the ideas concerning universal inalienahle human 



THE DONATISTS. 21 

rights^ concerning liberty of conscience^ concerning the 
rights of free religious conviction, "^"^^ 

The election of a church officer was the accidental occa- 
sion of this rupture. But when the emperor compelled " an- 
other more important matter, the employment of force in 
matters of religion" evoked a spirit long existing, and a 
zeal that force could not subdue. " Christ persecutes no 
one ; he was for inviting, not forcing men to the faith. 
Why do you not permit every man to follow his own free 
will? Christ in dying for men has given Christians the 
example to die, but not to kill." Such was the language 
of the Donatist bishop, Petihan. The Catholics, on the 
other hand, with Augustine at their head, argued that " men 
were authorized and bound to employ force," and compel 
men to enter the visible Church, from Luke xiv. 23. 

Such was the commencement of a controversy continued 
to this day. In many of the incidental circumstances of 
the quarrel, the Donatists may have been wrong, and Avere 
wrong, because they were but men, but in the great prin- 
ciples which remained with them, of opposition to the 
Catholics sweeping the world mto the Church,^ and compell- 
ing the consciences of m^n, they were right, and the means 
of exhibiting an important part of Christian truth and 
Church life. 

God chooses his people in the fires of affliction, and he 
purifies them there. These Donatists, joined gradually by 
other sects Avho broke off from the Catholics in search of a 
purer faith, seemed to have formed the germ of the Wal- 
denses. This alone accounts for the tradition ever faithfully 
maintained by them and acknowledged by their enemies, 

1 History of the Christian Rohgion and Church, vol. ii. p. 182-21'?. 
Torroy. 2 ISTeandor, vol. ii. p, 205, G. 



22 THE DOXATISTS. 

that they had mamtaiiied a distinct existence from the time 
of PojDe Sylvester, the time when, under Constantine, the 
union between Church and State Tras completely effected. 
IsTeander considers this " the true historical origin of the 
sect" of the Waldenses/ and there is every reason to feel 
assured of the truth of this opinion. It was imiversally 
acknowledged among them. Reinerius Saccho, who had 
the best means of knowing, havhig been for seventeen years 
one of them, but not ^^^iting untiL he became a Catholic 
Inquisitor, a.d. 1250, states this fact, and adds that theii* 
miiversal extension and high antiquity make them the 
most dangerous enemies of the Cathohc Church. 

There is still extant among the remains left by these most 
ancient Protestants, a Treatise on Antichrist, which is an 
authentic exposition of their faith. It is generally consid- 
ered to have been written about a.d. 1120, but Xeander 
thinks it may have been much older.^ It thus describes 
Antichrist: "He arrived at maturity when men whose 
hearts were set upon the world multi23hed m the Church, 
and 5y tJie %mion of Church and State got the poioer of 
both into their hands, ♦ * * * jj^ teaches t^ baptize 
children into the faith, and attributes to this the work of 
regeneration, thus confounding the work of the Holy Spirit 
m regeneration T^ith the external rite of baptism, and on 
this foundation bestows orders, and mdeed grounds all his 
Christianity." ^ 

The reactionary spirit against the corruptions of the State 
Church, appears ui this extract to have given clearness to 

^ Church History, voL iv. p. 605, and notes. *2 Yo\. iv. p. 605. 

3 Jones' Church History, p. 338, whose quotations I have followed, he 
having gone over the whole ground carefully, with Wall and Perrin before 
him. 



THE DOKATISTS, 23 

the pious authors of this Treatise. It is the benefit which 
the presence of error occasions to the Church, that it pro- 
duces in contrast a faith more sharply defined, exact, and 
clear. When the Donatists first broke loose from the Cath- 
ohcs, they saw the corruption of their opponents to such a 
degree that they re-baptized all who came over to them 
from the Romish party. But they did not then define and 
trace out so clearly the origin and principles of Romish 
errors, as after long observation. At the time w^hen the 
Donatist secession finally and fully seems to have occurred, 
the time of Sylvester, about a.d. 330, and for one hundred 
and fifty years after, infant baptism according to Neander, 
^^ entered rarely and loith difficulty into the life of the 
ChurchP It had not become the universal or even the 
usual practice.^ 

On this account at first there is httle distinction recorded 
between the Catholics and the Donatists in regard to tliis 
point. The latter were soon kho^vn universally as Anabap- 
tists in the views of their opponents, because they de- 
nied the validity of the Cathohc baptism, and repeated it, 
generally, adhering to a primitive exclusiveness in its admin- 
istration.^ The repetition was on account of the general 
worldliness and corruption of that Church, but specific at- 
tention had not then been turned to many of the errors 
in detail. It is even probable that mdividual cases of infant 
baptism may have existed among the earlier Donatists. But 
the Christian consciousness of a Divine life awakened with- 
in, tended always to the purity of the Church, operating 
with a reactive force against tlie errors of the Catholics, 
and must have prevented this error from spreadmg far, wliile 
it eventually woke up agamst them many an indignant re- 

» Vol. ii. p. 319. 2 Haso'3 Church Histoiy, sec. 142. 



24 



ARKOLD OF BRESCIA. 



monstrance like the above from, the Treatise on Anti- 
christ. 

From this time forward we shall find, in connection with 
the warmest defenses of liberty of conscience, the most 
solemn protests agamst mfant baptism. The Petrobrus- 
sians (a.d. 11 10) and the Henricians (a.d. 1140) both be- 
came extensive sects earnestly opposed to the worldliness 
of the clergy and to mfant baptism.^ 

Arnold of Brescia about this time, a.d. 1136-57, main- 
tamed the same views, but with a greater vigor and imme- 
diate pohtical efiect and distmctness than any of his prede- 
cessors or cotemporaries. Liberty, sacred and secular, 
was the great object of his life. He produced an immense 
effect upon Europe and his age, and gave aln impulse to 
those reforming movements in the Church of Rome that 
are distinctly traceable as the germs from which, four hun- 
dred years later, sprang the great Protestant Reforma- 
tion.'^ 

This remarkable reformer on returning home to Bres- 
cia, his native city, was observed to have midergone a 
change. " The inspiring idea of his movements," says Ne- » 
ander, " was that of a holy and a pure Church. His life cor-f 
responded with his doctrine. Zealously opposing the cor- 
ruption of the w^orldly-minded clergy, he set the example 
himself by his dress and his entire mode of living — a fact 
which even his most violent enemies could but acknowledge.'* 

This w^as the young clergyman " who gave the first im- 
pulse to the new reaction against the secularization of the 
clergy and against the power of the Pope in temporal thmgs." 
Impressed with holy fervor under the lectures of the cele- 
brated Abelard, he put hunself at the head of a j^arty " in 



Neander, vol. iv. p. 595. 



2 Ibid., p. 147, 162, 180. 



AEI^OLD OF BKESCIA. 25 

oj)position to the practice of mixing up things spriritual 
and secular." He required that the bishops should abjure 
their princely powers, and that the clergy should be content 
with whatever the love of the communities might bestow 
on them for their support. He was disposed to make much 
depend on experimental religion, or "the subjective char- 
acter of the men" who officiated m church matters. In 
fact, the great object at which he aimed was a Spiritual 
Church, and one chief method of accomplishmg it was to 
be its entire separation from the State, while the baptism 
of adults only was another. 

As Dr. Brewster says,^ "Insisting that the Kingdom of 
God is not of this world, he mamtained that the temporal 
power of the Church was an unprincipled usurpation of the 
rights of princes, and that all the corruptions which dis- 
graced the Christian faith, and all the animosities which 
distracted the Church, sprang from the overgrown pos- 
sessions of the clergy." He commenced in his native city, 
but it was in Home itself that the amazing power of this 
man and of his principles were chiefly succesful. He re- 
stored the Roman Republic, and maintained it for ten years. 
Four Popes successively driven from the Eternal City, tried 
in vain to subdue him. At last when Frederick Barba- 
rossa, hired for that purpose, had succeeded in capturing 
him, so fearful of his popularity were those in power, that 
having strangled him in prison, his body was burned and 
his ashes thrown into the Tiber, lest the people should idol- 
ize his beloved remains. 

The same desire for the purity of the Church which 
in one direction led him to oppose the mixing up of tem- 
poral power, in another direction brought him m opposi^ 

* Edinburg Enc7clopa3dia, Art. Arnold. 
2 



26 



THE WALDENSES. 



tioii to infimt baptism. A cotemporary of his remarks 
tliat "lie is said to have judged erroneously in regard to 
the sacrament of the altar [/. e, transubstantiation], and 
the baptism of infants." ^ Evervmus and Bernard, also his 
opponents, both appear to allude to him as ridiculing infant 
baptism, wliile in a Bull issued in 1181, the Arnoldists are 
included in the category of sects " not afraid to oppose the 
doctrmes of the Church on baptism and the Lord's Sup- 
per." Indeed, Arnold was condemned by Pope Innocent 
II., in the Lateran Council of 1139, as an opponent of 
infant baptism. Dr. Murdoch, the translator of Mosheim, 
seems inclined to doubt if lie is alluded to in the decrees 
of that council, because he is not mentioned by name. But 
a cotemporary writer, Otto Bishop Freysingen, expressly 
declares that he and the Petrobrussians Avere both con- 
demned by that council, and his authority in this matter is 
justly regarded as decisive by Mosheim, Giesler, and Me- 
ander. Though the man was slain, his followers long sur- 
vived as a distinct sect, and by such leaders, recruits were 
added, and other bodies of Christians were gradually drawn 
together by an inward principle and driven together by 
common persecutions, until under the name Waldenses 
several sects, dissimilar in many of their opinions though 
united in common Evangelical principles, continued to be 
known for centuries as the friends of spiritual liberty. 

To what extent they rejected infant baptism has long- 
been a matter of dispute. That many of them did so is 
beyond question. And, on the other hand, that some of 
the sects who went under this general name continued to 
practice it, we do not doubt. But Lhnborch, whose ac- 
count of them Wall endorses as the most accurate and dis- 
1 Sgo Giesler, vol. ii. sec. 51, note 6. 



THE WALDT3]NSES. 27 

criminating,^ says " To speak my own mind freely, the Al- 
bigenses and Waldenses appear to me to have been two dis- 
tinct sects, and they were entirely ignorant of many tenets 
now ascribed to them. Particularly the Waldenses appear 
to have been plain men, unskillful and mexperienced, and 
if their opinions and customs loere to be examined loithout 
prejudice^ it would appear that among all the modern sects 
of Christians they bear the greatest resemblance to that of 
the Mennonites," or modern Dutch Baptists.^ This author 
gives the acknowledgment of an Albigensian nobleman, on 
which he was condemned, that he had listened to one of the 
more distinguished of their teachers, Peter Auterd (about 
A.D. 1300), 23reaching that the baptism of water, made by 
the Church, was of no avail to children, who were so far 
from consenting to it that they wept. He also cites the 
sentence of the Inquisition on Stephana di Proando for de- 
nying, among other things, " baptism of water administered 
to children." Yet it is clear that they did not, as often 
supposed, deny all water baptism, but only its being essen- 
tial to salvation, or useful to infants, for another witness is 
also cited saying that " no baptism availed any thing, no 
not their oionP ^ 

M. de Potter, in his Ecclesiastical History, says that '' they 
opposed the sacraments, rejecting all the ceremonies of bap- 
tism except the ablution, and they had care that this should 
never be conferred on children of a tender age ; and it is 
for that reason they used to baptize anew all the persons 
who, leaving the Romish Church, claimed to embrace their 
doctrines." "" 

^ Infant Baptism, vo^ ii. p. 230. 

2 Histpry of the Inquisition, vol. 1. chap. viii. ^ Ibid., chap. viii. 

4 See Hague's Centenary Address, Appendix, p. 'ZT. 



28 -^ THE WALDEJSrSES. 

What is more remarkable than general statements of this 
kind, and more important to our present j)i^iTOse, is that 
the strongest expressions in favor of liberty of conscience 
are found in the mouths of those who also opposed infant 
baptism. This we have already noticed, as well as the cause 
of it, in the case of Arnold of Brescia and the Dissertation 
on Antichrist. 

There is an epitome of the faith of the Waldenses of the 
twelfth century, given by the Centuriators of Magdeburg, 
which does not say any thing about mfant baptism one 
way or other, but asserts " the Pope hath not the prunacy 
over all the Churches of Christ, neither hath he the poioer 
of both sicords,^^ But another full confession of their faith 
of the same century (a.d. 1120), says, "We hold in ab- 
horrence all human inventions, as proceeding from Anti- 
christ, which lyroduce distress and are prejudicial to the 
liberty of the mind. We consider the Sacraments as signs 
of holy things, or as the visible emblems of mvisible bless- 
ings. We regard it as proper and even necessary that be- 
lievers use these symbols or visible forms when it can be 
doue. ]SJ"otwithstanding we maintain that believers may 
be saved without these signs when they have neither place 
nor opportunity of observing them." ^ 

The testimony of an enemy is important here, ^neas 
Sylvius, afterward Pope Pius II. (a.d. 1458), in his His- 
tory of Bohemia, gives this account of the Waldenses. 
He says, " they assert that the Church of Rome ceased to 
be the true Church from the time of Pope Sylvester, at 
which time the poison of temporal advantages was cast into 
the Church. * * * They reject all the titles of prelates, 
as pope, bishop, &c. They affirm that no man ought to be 
1 Jones, p. 333. 



THE WALDEKSES. 29 

forcibly compelled in matters of faith. * * * Tliey con- 
demn all the Sacraments of the Church. Concerning the 
sacrament of baptism they say that the Catechism signifies 
nothing, that the absolution pronounced over mfants avails 
them nothing — that the godfathers and godmothers do not 
understand what they answer the priest." ^ 

In 1540 the Parliament of Aix passed a law that the Wal- 
denses residmg in Provence, and who were the subjects of 
the French King, " should all he destroy edP This sentence 
was brutally carried into effect five years afterward. But 
they strove in the mean time to conciliate their persecutors 
by presenting them with a Confession of their Faith, drawn 
up in language of touching simplicity. In it they say, 
" We acknowledge that kings, princes and governors are 
the appomted and established ministers of God, whom we 
are bound to obey. From this power and authority no 
man can exempt himself, as is manifest from the example of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, who vokmtarily paid tribute, not tah- 
ing upon liiinself any jurisdiction of temporal poioer, * "^^ '^ 
By baptism we are received into the holy congregation of 
God's people, previously professing and declaring our faith 
and change of life." 

Enough this to show that from the time of Pope Sylves- 
ter, that is, from the time of Constantino, when he united 
the spiritual and temporal power, there is every reason 
to feel assured that there has been a body of men who have 
opposed the whole of this, and have vigorously maintained 
freedom of conscience and the entire separation of Church 
and State. The above extracts will also show on what 
grounds and to what extent, even before the modern strug- 
1 Jones, p. 324. 



80 THE MEISTNONITES. 

gles since the Reformation, this may be considered a Bap 
tist principle and pecuharity. 

If we turn now to the history of this great principle since 
the Reformation, the Mennonites must claim our first no- 
tice. At a time when all other denommations sought to 
establish themselves by alHances with the State, and too 
frequently by becommg the persecutors of their brethren, 
the Mennonites, who sprang out of the Waldenses in 1536,^ 
contended for perfect liberty of conscience, and that the 
magistrates had no right to interfere with religious convic- 
tions. This opinion is founded on "the one prmciple," 
which, as Mosheim justly remarks, is at the basis of all their 
peculiarities, i. e. " that the kingdom which Christ has estab- 
lished on earth is a visible society or company, in which is no 
place for any but holy or pious persons." Hence all connec- 
tion with mere State institutions, where the terms of mem- 
bership must be different, they regarded as injurious. In 
this they have always persevered, and when about the year 
1820, on the publication of the proofs of their ancient ori- 
gin, by Professor Upeij and Dr. Dermont, they were offered 
government support by the King of the Netherlands, and 
recognition as a State reUgion, they declined the bounty on 
the ground that it was contrary to their oldest and most 
settled principles. 

How different was the conduct of all their cotempora- 
ries m the work of religious reformation, great, pious and 
sincere as they doubtless were. There is not a Creed nor 
a Confession of Faith framed by any of the Reformers which 

1 See Mosheim's Cent. XYI, sec. 3, part 2, chap, iii., n. 22, and extracts 
from " An account of the origin of the Dutch Baptist's Kehgion," Ency. 
Art. Mennonites. 



EltNTGLISH PROTESTAITTS. 31 

does not give to the magistrate a coercive power in religion.^ 
Luther says of false teachers, " I am very averse to the 
shedding of blood. 'Tis sufficient that they should be ban- 
ished," but he allows they may be " corrected and forced at 
least to silence, put under restraint as madmen." As to the 
Jews, he thought "their Synagogues should be leveled 
with the ground, their houses burned, and their books, even 
to the Old Testament, taken from them." Several of the 
Anabaptists were also put to death by the Lutherans " for 
propagating their errors, contrary to the judgment of the 
Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel." 

^N'or can Calvin be acquitted of the death of Servetus. 
He says himself " it was by my prosecution he was impris- 
oned," and expressed the " hope that they would condemn 
him to death, though not the terrible one of being burned." 
Melancthon, Bucer, and many other of the Reformers, wrote 
letters of approval, saying that " to endeavor to destroy his 
dreams by a tram of reasoning, what would it be but to 
grow mad Avith a madman." Beza wrote a public defense 
of persecution, and in 1618 the Synod of Dort urged upon 
the civil power the restraint and punishment of heresy, in 
consequence of which one man was unmediately beheaded, 
another condemned to perpetual imprisonment, and several 
to banishment.^ 

In England the same spirit prevailed. Henry VIII. 
burned Papists and Baptists at the same stake to prove 
himself Defender of the Faith, and Cranmer's hands were 
stained with the blood of pious women, while Queen Eliza- 
beth re-lighted the fires of Smithfield, like her father, to 
burn Anabaptists and Catholics. King James resolved to 

* Struggles and Triumphs of Religious Liberty, p. 8Y. 

2 See Cumberland's Introduction to Limborch's Ilistory of the Inquisition. 



1 



32 THE BEOWNISTS. ^M 

" break the spirit of the Xon-conformists if it would not ' 
bow," and caused them to quit the country m large num- 
bers. In the reign of Charles I., Archbishop Laud ruled 
the Church Avitli a rod of iron ; fines, imprisonments, cut- 
tmg off the ears, brandmg in the face, and tortures of all 
kinds were inflicted. 

Xor did the Presbyterians when they obtained the 
power, neglect using the authority of the State to persecute, 
as well as promote, in their turn. Tn 1638, while Roger 
Williams was batthng for freedom of conscience with Mas- 
sachusetts, and nearly thirty years after their pruiciples had 
been publicly avowed in London by the Baptists, we find 
the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Scot- 
land interfering with the liberty of the press and the civil 
power in a manner never exceeded by Popery itself. They 
forbade '' all prmters m the kingdom fi-om printing or re- 
printmg cmy confession of faith, or protestation, o?' reasoii 
pro or contra^^ in regard to religious controversies, " with- 
out warrant subscribed by the clerk to the Assembly." ^ 
In 1642, Roman Catholics were ordered to renounce their 
"obstinacy" under penalty of banishment or imprisonment, 
as might seem fit. 

Even the Brownists " agreed but too well T\ith them," 
as [N'eal testifies " in asserting the necessity of an uniform- 
itjr of public worship, and of callmg in the sword of the 
magistrate for the support and defense of their several 
pi'inciples, which they made an ill use of m their turn as 
they could grasp the power into their hands." And the In- 
dependents while they reformed many of theu' opinions, 
held fast to this as we shall see. 

On the restoration of Charles IL, two thousand Xon- 
' Pictorial History of England, vol. iii. p. 472. Harper. 



THE IKDEPE]S[DEISrTS. 83 

conformist ministers nobly resigned their benefices at once 
rather than conform to the tyranny of Government interfer- 
ence in a sjDecific case against themselves. But they never 
publicly abandoned the principle of a union of Church and 
State, but remained just as Chalmers did who headed the 
Free Church movement, though theoretically in favor of 
an established religion. It may be questioned whether, a 
hundred years ago, if an establishment broad enough to 
have included them had been proposed in England, the 
bulk of the Independents would not have favored it. 

But in 1560, early in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the 
Baptists in Great Britain publicly wrote and pubhshed their 
protestations against all persecution, for conscience' sake. 
John Knox replied to one of these publications, in a Trea- 
tise called " An Answer to a great number of blasphemous 
Cavillations, written by an Anabaptist and adversary of 
God's eternal Predestination, and confuted by John Knox." 
Alluding to persecuting Christians, the Baptist had said, 
^' Be these I pray you, the sheep Avhom Christ hath sent 
forth in the midst of wolves ; can the sheep persecute the 
wolf? Doth Abel kill Cain? Doth David, though he 
might, kill Saul ? Doth he which is born after the Spirit 
kill him that is born after the flesh ?" 

To all this John Knox replies, " I will not now so much 
labor to confute by my pen, as my full purpose is to lay the 
same to thy charge if I shall apprehend thee in any com- 
monwealth where justice against blasphemers may be min- 
istered as God's word requireth. And hereof I give thee 
warning lest that after thou shalt complain that under the 
cloak of friendsliip I liave deceived thee. Wert thou my nat- 
ural brother I durst not conceal thine iniquity in this case." ^ 

* Struggles and Triumphs, pp. HO, 3. 
2^c 



34 THE BKOAVXISTS. 

Toward the close of the sixteenth centmy theii' numbers 
increased in England. They regarded Christ as the Su- 
preme Governor of the Church, denied that the queen had 
any authority to appouit mhiisters of religion, or frame any 
ecclesiastical government, and asserted that the Church 
ought to be composed of " hvely stones," and that it was un- 
lawful to baptize children. 

It is true that on the accession of King James to the 
Enghsh throne, some few of the Puritans and Independ- 
ents were favorable to a more enlarged religious toleror 
tion than was then practiced, under certain restrictions of 
officers, appointed by the State to supervise their proceed- 
ing; and a j^etition was presented to that effect m 1609, by 
a JMi*. Jacob and others ; but the malienable right to Hb- 
erty of conscience, even those petitioners had yet to dis- 
cover. 

About this time, also, a number of the Brownists,nvho 
already held to a converted church-membership, and had 
fled to England, followed out this prmciple to its legitimate 
conclusion, became BajDtists and were excommunicated by 
then' brethren in exile. ^ They also found light break upon 
them m regard to the principle of hberty of conscience 
and the union of Church and State. This led to a discus- 
sion of all these principles in Holland. In 1610, we find 
John Robmson, the celebrated Puritan divine, the father 
of the Pilgrims, writing earnestly in defense of the power 
of the magistrate "to jDunish civilly, religious actions," 
" he being the preserver of both tables and so to punish all 
branches of both." He is to " by compulsion, repress j^ublic 
and notable idolatry, as also to provide that the truth of 
God hi his ordinance be taught and published, and by some 
^ Struggles and Triumphs, pp. 197, 8. 



JOHN ROBINSON AND THE BAPTISTS. 35 

penalty to provoke his subjects universally unto hearing for 
their instruction and conversion ; yea, to inflict the same 
upon them if after due teaching they offer not themselves 
unto the Church?''^ 

Opposed to him was John Smyth, originally an Episcopal 
cleigyman, of such superior abilities that Bishop Hall speaks 
even of John Robinson as no more than his " shadow." 
He thinking it would be a great help and encouragement 
to the Baptists in England for the exiles to return and 
openly avow their sentiments, put himself at the head of 
his brethren and returned with them as their pastor to Lon- 
don, in order as they declared that Christ might say to 
them, ministering to their persecuted brethren, " I was in 
prison and ye visited me, in distress and ye comforted me." 
'' They determined to challenge king and State to their 
faces, and not give way to them, no, not a foot." Thus they 
returned to their own country, there to vindicate the great 
principles of moral and religious freedom. How much 
England, how much America, how much the whole world 
owes and will owe to this one great act of unsurpassed 
moral heroism, who can tell ? From the hour they set foot 
in England, those principles have been steadily advancing. 
From their advocacy, in all probability, Roger Williams, then 
a lad, must have first heard of them. And by him, some 
twenty-three or four years later, they were nobly evolved 
upon American ground, and thus became the germ of that 
perfect religious liberty we now enjoy. In 1611, they pub- 
lished a Confession of their Faith. In this, true to the 
Waldensian spirit that had existed for so many ages, they 
declare that " the magistrate is not to meddle with rehgion, 
or matters of conscience, nor compel men to this or that 
1 Struggles and Triumphs, p. 210. 



36 JOHX ROBIXSON AIN'D THE BAPTISTS. 

form of religion, because Christ is the King and Lawgiver 
of the Church and Conscience." 

John Robinson m Holland not only opposed the return 
of Mr. Smyth to England, but was still more opposed to 
his views of the right of Conscience. In 1614, he pub- 
hshed an attack upon these, which led to an extended con- 
troversy between him and Mr. Helwisse, Mr. Smyth's suc- 
cessor. The following passage v>'ill be enough to show the 
Baptist view m this discussion : 

'' The power and authority of the Idng is earthly, and 
God hath commanded me to submit to all ordinances of man. 
Therefore I have fiitli to submit to what ordmances of man 
soever the king commands ; if it be a human ordinance and 
not against the manifest word of God. But my soul, 
wherewith I am to vrorship God, that belongeth to another 
KiXG, whose kingdom is not of this world, whose people 
must come ^Wllingly, whose wea2)ons are not carnal, but 
spiritual." '' As to the breach of Christ's laws. His king- 
dom is spiritual. His laws sj^iritual, the transgression spirit- 
ual, the punishment spiritual, everlasting death of the soul. 
Xo carnal or worldly weapon is given to the supportation 
of His kmgdom." " ]Magistracy is God's blessed ordinance 
in its right ^^lace, but let us not be mser than God." Such 
were some of the words of Helwisse, and the avowed faith of 
all Baptists.^ And yet, ten years after, we find John Rob- 
inson defending the right of the magistrates to persecute 
error, and promote what they think to be true religion, by 
the power of State. Well might he tell the dei^arting pil- 
grims that he was " verily persuaded and confident that the 
Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of His holy 
word." Well would it have been for the prmciples of 
1 Struggles and Triumphs, preface, p. 11. 



ROGEK WILLIAMS. 37 

religious liberty if on the other side of the Atlantic the 
pilgrims had been ready to act upon that last counsel ; — " if 
God reveal any thing to you by any other instrument of His, 
be as ready to receive it as ever you were to receive any 
truth by my ministry." 

It will be evident thus far that the difference between 
the Baptists and all other Christian sects, at this time, was 
not one of degree, but of principle. It v^as not as to the 
measure of toleration, but of an inalienable right to abstract 
liberty of conscience. ]^or was it a mere negation for which 
they contended, and on which they built, but a positive 
principle, that the Lord was Kmg in Zion, that His control 
over the conscience was supreme, and that human interfer- 
ence was wrong because a usurpation of his prerogative. 

While these publications were taking place m London 
(1615), Bacon, as Attorney-general, was torturing a clergy- 
man for writing a seditious sermon he never even preached. 
In Bacon's own language, he questioned him " before tor- 
ture, between torture, anel after torture," as Dr. W. R. 
Williams who narrates this uicident, well remarks, "thus 
turning the spit of human sacrifice." Sir Edward Coke 
refused to sanction this act as legal, in the folio whig year. 

About this time, or soon after, a Welsh lad was noticed 
by this same Sir Edward Coke on account of his manu- 
script notes of cases argued before the Star Chamber, and 
of Sermons. This great man, the promoter of liberty, 
became the patron, friend, and almost father of this lad, who 
in turn cherished an enthusiastic regard for the life and 
writings of his benefxctor. Coke got him into one of 
the most famous public schools in London — the Charter 
House — where his abilities won him distinguished honors, 
and a pension for his support at the University. The name 



38 ROGER WILLIAMS. 

of this yoiitli is still preserved at Jesus' College, Oxford — • 
Roger Williams. It will ever be preserved in tlie records 
of the great statesmen of the world, of the great Lights 
of Religions Liberty, and above all of those whose names 
are written in heaven. 

Ordained hi the Church of England about 1628, he very 
shortly afterward became so strongly Puritan that he could 
not use the prayer-book of the Church of England, and 
found it unsafe to remain in the country for fear of the per- 
secutions of Laud. Li 1630, therefore, he sailed for Amer- 
ica and jomed the Pilgrims who had preceded hun only 
by about ten years. But his zeal and the measure of his 
knowledge already had outrun theu*s, and he soon found 
himself exposed to various kinds of misconstruction and 
persecution. It would seem that from the tune of his arri- 
val he steadily set his face agamst all kmds of religious in- 
tolerance, and compulsion in matters of faith and conscience. 
For five years, however, he remained among his Puritan 
brethen, his peculiar views gradually drawing round liim 
warm friends on the one side, and stern opposition on the 
other, until at length banished from Salem in 1635, after 
fourteen weeks with neither bed nor bread, he settled do^^Ti 
at Providence, there to develop the germ of a new style of 
government among men, one which recognized the rights of 
God as supreme, and presumed not to molest the conscience. 
For this government and on these principles he secured a 
charter, and at his ovm. cost watched over its mfant liberties. 

To Rogers Williams belongs unquestionably the honor of 
bemg the first Christian legislator who formally recognized 
this great principle in the establishment and administration 
of any government, ^or is it easy to estimate the boldness 
required to achieve it, or the value of this success to the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 39 

world. Doubtless his love and veneration for his great 
patron had done much to form and mature in his mind 
principles of constitutional freedom applied to religion. But 
he went to lengths that his benefactor would never have 
thought of going, and for advocating which the descendants 
of that great man abused him grossly. It seems hardly 
probable that one of his cast of mind had failed to hear of 
and notice the controversy raging with fierceness all through 
his youth in London, on the subject of religious liberty. 
Certain it is that from the first he seems to have grasped 
with precision all the consequences of his prmciples. "It is 
wonderful," as Bancroft has said, '' with what distinctness 
Roger Williams deduced his inferences, the readiness with 
which he accepted every fair mference from his doctrines, 
and the circumspection with which he repelled every unjust 
imputation." One thing is certain, it was the light within 
that enabled him to perceive a truth that might have re- 
mained hidden to this day from mere worldly sagacity and 
statesmanship. Even Oliver Cromwell, England's great 
Protector, and one less disposed to persecute than the 
Prelatists, or Puritans, of his day, developed not, in his 
whole course of government, one principle or practice of 
half the value of this to the world. Indeed, he claimed the 
right, as head of the State, to persecute Roman Catholics 
and Episcopalians, and even to examine every minister as 
to his call to preach. Not an uninstructive contrast might 
be exhibited to the world were Mr. Carlyle to place the 
characters of these two governors side by side, and weigh 
them in the balance impartially, either as to the ideas on 
which they wrought, or the consequences of them to the world. 
But it is upon American soil, and by contrast' with the 
principles then developmg themselves on this side of the 



40 LORD BALTIMORE. 

Atlantic, that tne character of Roger Williams will be most 
fairly estimated. Strange to say, it is that Chm'ch drunk 
with the blood of the saints, which for ages persecuted the 
suffering Waldenses that alone has ventured to contend 
with Roger "Williams for the honor of first proclaiming re- 
ligious freedom to the world by law. Archbishop Hughes 
has preferred this claim in behalf of the Roman Catholic 
proprietor of Maryland, Lord Baltimore. But with what 
preposterous injustice this claim is urged, let facts show. It 
is said that, as early as 1632, he had recognized a general 
religious toleration. But where is the proof of it in any 
authentic shape before 1648 ? Not in the Charter certainly, 
which contains no single hmt of any toleration in religion 
not vouchsafed by the laws of England. But, on the other 
hand, places of worship, it is provided, are to be consecrated 
according to the '' ecclesiastical law of England," aii^ all 
laws were to be " so far as conveniently might be, consonant 
to the laws of England," which would, of course, have 
force until others were enacted. The most which can be 
pretended, therefore, is, that the desire and intention to 
extend this toleration resided in the breast of Lord Balti- 
more, although he had not the power to give it the force 
of legal enactment. But we have seen that, so far as this 
was concerned, twenty-one years before this time, the Bap- 
tists in London, had j)nblished to the world far more noble 
sentiments in favor of religious freedom. Roger Williams 
had probably uttered far higher principles two years before ; 
and for centuries and centuries the Waldenses had protested 
against the Roman Catholic Church for her opposition to 
all these very principles, and had maintained the doctrine 
of religious freedom far more thoroughly and fairly than 
Lord Baltimore ever dreamed of. 



KOGER WILLIAMS. 41 

But it was not until 1649 that this toleration was duly 
enacted/ In what way, then, can it be pretended that the 
Roman Catholic has precedence of the Baptist as to dates. 
In 1630, Roger Williams commenced to preach in favor of 
religious liberty; and in 1686, having purchased territory 
from the Indians, commenced to found a colony on the ex- 
press principle of perfect religious liberty.. In 1638, others 
having joined, and purchased the territory of the present 
State of Rhode Island, a voluntary government was formally 
instituted by a solemn covenant of all to " submit to the 
orders of the major part in civil things onlyP Thus was a 
constitution formed on the express basis of a perfect liberty of 
conscience.^ It is true that it was not until 1644 that Roger 
"Williams obtained his Charter from the king. This was not 
sought, even then, because he deemed it necessary, but only 
expedient, as a means of preventing the encroachments of 
the colony of Massachusetts. This Charter was obtained, 
and solemnly accepted and adopted by the inhabitants, in 
1647 ; and on the 10th of May, in that year, a body of laws 
was enacted, and the government further settled upon the 
principle of perfect religious liberty.^ Even this last was 
about two years previous to any enactment in favor of 
toleration afterward established in Maryland. A more vital 
point, however, than one of dates remains to be considered. 

The very word toleration implies a right to persecute ; and 
how far was immunity in this case to extend ? When first, 
in 1649, it took the form of law, Avhiie allowing general re- 
ligious liberty to others, it denounced death, with forfeiture 
of goods, against all Avho should deny the Godhead of any 
of the three persons of the Trinity, and fine, whipphig, and 

^ See Ilildretb, vol. i. pp. 20t, 347. 

2 Ilildroth, vol. i. p. 25G. 3 Ibid., vol. i. p. 322. 



I 



42 WILLIAM PE:N-]sr, 

banishment, against all who should utter any reproachful 
words or speeches respecting the Virgin Mary, it Avas 
expressly declared that the Roman CathoHc Church should 
have all its rights and privileges, and that, in particular, no 
Roman Catholic should be molested. In fact, it was a mere 
plan to mclude Papists m a religious Uberty just broad 
enough to shield ihem from the persecutions of the Puritans, 
hut no brocoder. Instead of equitable terms of citizenship, 
it would have put to death such men as Dr. Channmg and 
Edward Everett ; and even Robert Hall, for the opinions of 
his earlier years. These laws were never repealed, and only 
superseded a few years ago by the adoption of a new Con- 
stitution. They probably remam the law to this day in the 
District of Columbia. 

Lord Baltimore was, indeed, no bigot, and far m advance 
of most of his own sect and age. But a claim Uke that put 
forth by Archbishop Hughes manifests a degree of effrontery 
rarely equaled. It will not be forgotten that just before 
the Revolution of 1688, James II. attempted a system of 
toleration of exactly this very character, merely to smuggle in 
the Catholics, and throw England back again into the arms 
of the Cathohc Church. The treachery was discovered, and 
James II. lost his throne soon after, none considering re- 
ligious liberty safe. 

About fifty years after Roger Wilhams had first advanced 
his views on the subject of religious Hberty, in 1682, Wil- 
liam Penn published in London his celebrated " Frame of 
Government," which has been justly considered to contain 
some of the most wise and admirable views ever set forth 
by one to whom so much power was committed. Himself 
by birth the son of a Baptist, and by conviction a Quaker, 
no small degree of liberty of conscience Avas naturally to be 



WILLIAM PEKK. 43 

expected in the constitution of tMs colony. And he care- 
fully provided '' that all persons who confess and acknowledge 
the Almighty and Eternal God to be the creator, upholder, 
and ruler of the world, * ♦ * shall in no ways be mo- 
lested nor compelled to frequent or maintain any rehgious 
worship." Yet only those who professed " faith in Jesus 
Christ" were allow^ed to become freemen, a clause which 
would now, perhaps, exclude from the rights of suffrage not 
only every infidel and Jew, but a large portion of the very 
denomination to secure whose equal rights of conscience the 
colony was especially planted. This .was far in advance of 
the age generally — it was in advance of Lord Baltimore's 
platform, out of deference to which it is not improbable that 
the clause as to faith in Christ was inserted, but it failed to 
recognize the true principle of '^ soul freedom," as set forth 
by Roger Williams in writings published forty years before. 
To Penn it doubtless seemed difficult to know where to draw 
the hne, as it has to many both before and since. That all 
law essentially rests upon a religious basis no wise man can 
doubt. So far, therefore, as universal religion teaches man, 
as man, the rights and duties which he owes to his fellow- 
citizens, so far his fellow-citizens may insist upon those 
rights being fully respected and those duties enforced. And 
it may also be their aim and policy to afford every oppor- 
tunity to cultivate the religious spirit, which is a part of 
man's nature universally. But it has no right to make 
opinions a crime, unaccompanied by any overt act. And to 
enforce what God has been pleased to reveal by specid 
revelation, is an insult to Him who declared, "My Idngdom 
is not of this world." Unquestionably those who acknowl- 
edge the truth of Christianity feel assured that it can hi no 
way contradict natural religion, but, on the contrary, gives 



44 WILLIAM PENN. 

to it its fullest, clearest, and most authentic expression, 
developing the highest moral truths ages in advance of what 
they might otherwise have been discovered by human wis- 
dom. So far, however, as Christianity is a special revela- 
tion, and enjoms any new and particular duties on men, 
such as to be baptized or join a church, it is no part of the 
duty or right of the civil government to enforce them.* To 
do so is to interfere with the prerogatives of the kiagdom 
of God. As to all matters of belief required by Christianity 
as a special revelation, it is still more objectionable to make 
them tests of citizenship. 

Here the principles of Roger Williams are far in advance 
of those of William Penn. But no man, no body of men, 
should be made an offender for a word, and the Friends, as 
a whole, have argued and wrought nobly in defense of an 
unfettered conscience. To them has been given the prerog- 
ative of suffering greatly m this cause, and enduring more 
than any others, unless it has been ourselves. And yet a 
smgular practical illustration may serve to shoAv how dan- 
gerous it is to trust even the best Christians with one par- 
ticle of excuse for using the power of the magistracy to 
promote the revealed truth, or put down error. In less 
than ten years from the promulgation of this " Frame of 
Government," the city of Philadelphia was thrown into no 

' In regard to laws for enforcing the observance of the Sabbath, the 
first point on which Roger WilUams commenced his protests, see Way- 
land's Moral Science, p. 190. A Sabbath, that is, a period for religious 
cultivation, is a duty of natural religion. Hence the observance of that 
duty ought to be protected from all possible molestation and inconvenience. 
Government offices should be closed, therefore, by law, and all influence 
without persecution thrown in favor of that day most acceptable to the 
consciences of the best and largest number of citizens. 



THE FRIEIS'DS. 45 

little confusion by the interference of Quaker magistrates, 
as such, in a dispute purely religious. 

George Keith, foreseeing that cert^n views of " plenary 
inward illumination" superseding the written word of God, 
would ultimately culminate in the modern Hicksite views, 
spoke much on this subject, for which he incurred fines and 
imprisonments from some of the authorities,, who were 
Friends. At last the case came before John Holmes, a 
magistrate and judge of considerable influence, but also a 
Baptist. He at once refused to concur with the Quaker 
magistrates, alleging that " it was a religious dispute, and 
therefore not fit for a civil court." The Keithians broke 
off from the rest of the Friends in 1691, procured a lot, 
and built a house of worship in Second street, Philadelphia. 
And when, a few years afterward, the Baptists were unfairly 
expelled from a place of #orship in Chestnut street, the 
use of this house of the Keithians was kindly offered to 
them. The members of that body shortly afterward be- 
came Baptists, and thus the house and valuable lot so long 
occupied by the First Baptist Church in Philadelphia, came 
into their possession — an apt illustration of the effects of the 
exact exercise of principles of perfect liberty of conscience. 
For some years there were many so-called Quaker Baptists 
connected with that church. 

DoAvn to the period of the American Revolution, all the 
other colonies probably, except Rhode Island and Pennsyl- 
vania, had more or less of an established Church, and there- 
fore religious persecution. In Virginia, where, from the 
first, the Church of England had been by laAV established, 
many acts were passed of a most intolerant character. 
Lord Baltimore and the Romanists were persecuted until a 
state of almost civil war existed between that colony and 



46 NEW ENGLAo^D. 

Maryland. LaTvs intended chiefly against the Quakers were 
used for the opj^ression of all, even the Presb^'terians, and 
before a.d. 1650, mole than one thousand ISTew England 
Congregationalists had been driven away by her oppressive 
severities/ In that State, as we shall hereafter see, the Bap- 
tists suffered severely until after the struggle of the Revo- 
lution began. 

In Xew England, as we have seen, the Congregationalists 
were, on principle, at war with liberty of conscience, perse- 
cuting bitterly alike Roman Catholics, Quakers, and Bap- 
tists, except as deterred by occasional interference from 
Great Britain. These errors brought about, by their natural 
operation, severe consequence. The same alliance of 
Church and the Magistracy, which led to the persecution 
of Roger Williams, led also to the burning of the supposed 
witches in Salem, the very to^\Tilkom which he Avas expelled. 
The same connection of the elective franchise and church mem- 
bership, led to tlie introduction of Unitarianism through the 
half covenant system. Tliis at least was one of the causes. 
In that colony no man could become a voter, or eligible to 
office, who was not a member of the Congregational Church. 
Hence arose a strong desire on the part of many of the 
children of the first settlers, men not themselves professing 
personal piety, to become members, so far at least as to 
possess political rights. To accommodate them, an act was 
passed in 1663 which recognized all persons sprinkled in 
infancy as members of the Church, and their children as 
entitled to baj^tism, even when the parents, making no pro- 
fession of personal faith, were not admitted to the commu- 
nion. In a few years later, another step inevitably followed, 
and such persons were invited to the table of the Lord, 

1 Howison's History of Virginia, vol. ii. p. 160. 



NEW ENGLAND. 4-7 

because tliey were already church members. Thus were 
those who were not pious introduced into the churches in 
vast numbers. The pulpits were then recruited from their 
ranks, until the ministry became a mere profession, not re- 
quiring even an avowed belief m the doctrine of the new 
birth. Such was the union of Church and State in New 
England, and such its results. 

The above is a rapid sketch of the history of religious 
liberty, prior to the last hundred years. It was essentially 
a Baptist principle, derived by them, and by them alone, 
from their views of church-membership. It was first in- 
troduced by Roger Williams into the registered principles 
of actual statesmanship. In all t?iis he was the precursor 
of Milton, and the superior of Oliver Cromwell and Jeremy 
Taylor. Bancroft has still further justly said : " If Coperni- 
cus is held in perpetual reverence, because on his death-bed 
he published to the world that the sun is the center of our 
system — if the name of Kepler is preserved in the annals 
of human excellence for his sagacity in detecting the laws 
of planetary motion — if the genius of Newton has been al- 
most adored for dissecting a ray of light, and weighing the 
heavenly bodies in a balance, let there be for the name of 
Hoger Williams at least some humble place among those 
who have advanced moral science, and made themselves the 
benefactors of mankind." 

§ II. Progress of Religious Liberty in the last Hundred 

Years. 

There is not now probably a State or Territory in this 
Union in which there is left even the vestige of an Estab- 
lished Church, or of direct persecution on account of relig- 
ious opinions, unless indeed among the Mormon settlements 



48 



A HUIS^DEED YEAKS AGO. 



in Utah. Hardly an American is to be found any where 
who would vote to restore these injurious principles. In- 
deed this may be considered as one of the most marked 
features of American, as distinct from European, Christianity. 
But a hundred years ago it was not so. There was more 
or less of an EstabUshed Church, and of persecution for 
conscience' sake, in the laws of all Europe, and of every one 
of the colonies, exce^^ting only in Rhode Island and Pemisyl- 
vania. This was not the fault of civil governments so much 
as of religious sects. Xot a single Pedobaptist denomina- 
tion held to the views now so universal m this country: 
Every one of them in turn had claimed and exercised the 
right to promote religion by law, which mvolves a right to 
persecute all ojDponents. It is now only about a hundred 
years (1746) since the Protestants ventured to apjDcar pub- 
licly m Languedoc and the south of France, so dreadful was 
the bitterness of the persecution to which they were sub- 
jected from the Catholics, after the massacre of St. Bar- 
tholomew, and the revocation of the Edict of ISTantes; I 
while, to this day, molestation and ^persecution of all Protest- 
ants are the most distmguishing characteristics of the French 
Papacy. The Episcopahans collected their tithes by law in 
England, and their tobacco tax in America, and conferred 
no offices of State but uj^on their own communicants, not 

sufferingr a Roman Catholic to vote, even in Ireland. Pres- 

* . . . 

byterianism was as clearly established by law m Scotland, 

and Congregationalism in Xew England. 

What, then, has Avr ought the change — what has given 
these United States such perfect religious liberty as all 
enjoy ? Beyond all question, the successful working of the 
principles of a free conscience in Rhode Island and Penn- 
sylvania. Massachusetts beside the one and Virgmia beside 



VIRGINIA. 49 

the other, fined, imprisoned, and maltreated in various 
ways, by law, for conscience' sake. Yet it was not fomid to 
render the people more religious. On the contrary, it 
alienated the minds of some of the best citizens from each 
other and from the State, and two of the most orderly, re- 
hgious, and pleasant cities to reside in, even to this day, are 
Providence and Philadelphia, one being at the time of the 
Revolution the largest city of the Union, the other proba- 
bly the wealthiest in proportion to its size. Hence, vfhen a 
struggle came which called for the most perfect union and 
strength of every colony individually, and of the v^hole 
collectively, the only course was to discontinue every occa- 
sion of dissension and alienation, by allowing a perfect free- 
dom of religious opinions. 

One immediate occasion of bringing all these principles 
into action was the persecution and estrangement produced 
by the Established religion in Virginia, preparing and unit- 
ing the public mind, to no small degree, in such a manner as 
to precipitate the American Kevolution. Rapacity in claim- 
mg the tobacco tax, which was the legal support of the 
Episcopal clergy, and negligence in the performance of their 
duties, had made the Established ministers unpopular with 
the planters, who had this tax to pay. A rotten system 
will, however, stand for a long time, provided there is noth- 
ing to give the people an idea of any thing better. But 
that idea once given, the first accident will overthrow an 
establishment that has lost its hold upon the afiections of 
the people. It was so now. Some small but zealous bodies 
of Baptists, converted in New England in the revivals un- 
der Whitefield, had moved southward £^s missionary com- 
munities,* and settled for a time in Virginia. Thpy were 
called New Lights, on account of their zeal, and were for 

3 



60 VIRGINIA. 

many years the constant subject of every indignity. But 
their zeal sustained them, and the more they were perse- 
cuted the more they gTeY>\ The complete contiyist which 
they exhibited to the prevailing coldness of all, and the utter 
deadness of the worldly ministers of the Established Church, 
elevated them in the eyes of the people. The Episcopal 
clergy lost their hold upon the religious feelings of the peo- 
ple by their profligacy, and these Baptists gained it by 
their zeal. 

The magistrates and aristocratic friends of the Estabhshed 
Church felt their danger, and imprisoned all the more zeal- 
ous Baptist preachers on whom they could lay hands. This 
only raised their pojDularity with the common people, until 
at length it became a saying of their enemies, that it was 
useless to incarcerate the BajDtists, as they vrould only 
preach more successfully from the prison windows. A short 
crop of tobacco at this juncture did what other^vise a cen- 
tury might not have effected — ^it united the powerful and 
haughty aristocracy of Virginia with the masses, agamst the 
Established Church. Tobacco was scarce, and the jjrice 
was high. The clergy demanded their per centage m kind, 
and refused to take the customary equivalent of the usual 
price per pound. The colony of Virginia passed a law in 
favor of commutation at the usual price, it bemg worth 
many times more. The clergy api^ealed through the 
Bishop of London, and an Order in Council nullified the 
law. So far, the Established Church triumphed. But 
when they brought a suit to recover, Patrick Henry, whose 
feelmgs were vith the masses, inflaming the j^assions of the 
jury T^ith his own eloquence, obtamed a verdict against the 
law, on revolutionary principles, which practically nuUified 
the power of the Crown, and made the colonial law su- 



VIRGINIA. 51 

preme. From that liaur, the influence of the Estabhshed 
Church was destroyed hi Vhginia. The aristocracy of Vir- 
ginia, through the House of Assembly, at once united in 
retaining Patrick Henry, the man of the people, to defend 
them, by destroying the Established Church. The work 
was done effectually. Baptists still contmued to be impris- 
oned and tried " for preachmg the Gospel of the Son of 
God ;" but this only awoke the orator of the people to 
higher efforts of eloquence. Liberty of conscience for per- 
secuted Baptist ministers, was the theme which inspired 
him mth an eloquence, the traditions of which almost sur- 
pass belief These things all wrought upon the public 
mmd to such an extent, that, in 1776, it is said fully two 
thirds of the people were dissenters. At the beginning of 
the Revolutionary War all persecution for religious opinions 
was forever blotted from the statute-books, and almost by 
the end of that struggle, the last vestige of the union of 
Church and State, or the compulsory support of religion, 
was, chiefly through the influence of the Baptists, abol- 
ished, in this the most populous and influential State of that 
time. Up to a certain point, the labors of Patrick Henry 
were of great use in securing these triumphs of religious 
liberty. He pleaded for them nobly and boldly, but the 
Baptists, on whose behalf he spoke, suffered for them and 
pleaded too. In some of the later stages of these move- 
ments, he hesitated and compromised, where Jefferson, 
who, though a free-thinker, had studied carefully the prin- 
ciples of the Baptists, took the lead, and carried them 
through. Others, of course, assisted in this great work be- 
sides Baptists ; the Presbyterians, vigorously ; and these 
two seemed to form the conscience, so to speak, of the 
movement. So little, however, were their prmciples appre- 



52 



NEW ENGLAND. 



ciated at the time, tliat the Methodists joined with the 
Episco23alians, and took decided ground in favor of the 
support of religion by the State/ and in every movement 
favorable to hberty of conscience and entire separation of 
Church and State, the Baptists " took the lead."^ 

N'or were they less active in other ^^arts of the country, 
or in other ways. In Massachusetts, up to the time of the 
Declaration of Independence, the Baptists were subjected 
to severe persecutions by the standuig order. Pecuniary 
assessments, considered quite unjust, were made in the name 
of religion. These demands the BajDtists refused to pay, 
and their property was seized to large, often exorbitant, 
amounts, the object being apparently thus to break them 
up. A committee of remonstrance was formed in Philadel- 
phia, and large funds were raised by committees of Baptist 
Churches and associations all over the country to assist in 
defraying their expenses and burdens. 

What made their case harder was, that the very men 
who were upholding Church establishments among Congre- 
gationalists, were opposmg them on purely Baptist princi- 
ples, when urged by the Church of England. The English 
Government clearly contemplated the taxing of all the 
American Colonies to suj^port the Episcopal clergy in them. 
Against this Dr. Chauncey wrote strongly : " We are in 
principle against all civil establishments m rehgion, and as 
we do not desire any establishment in support of our otvti 
religious sentiments or practice, we can not reasonably be 
blamed if we are not disposed to encourage one in favor of 
the Episcopal colonists." He went on to declare that the 
religion of Jesus Christ had suffered more from such estab- 
lishments than from aU other causes ]Dut together, and that 

^ Hawkes, p. 142. ^ Howison, vol. ii. p. 1'70. 



ISAAC BACKUS. 53 

the primitive purity, simplicity, and glory of religion would 
never be restored till they were all put down. And yet 
this very man for thirty years advocated the compulsory 
support of Congregationalist worship by law." 

The plan adopted in Massachusetts seemed indeed com- 
paratively mild in itself, considered for an establishment. 
'Each parish called its own minister, and then a tax was laid 
on all by law for his support. If dissenters could prove 
that they Avere members of some other congregation, to the 
support of which they paid, they were to receive a certiii 
cate of exemption. These certificates, however, were so 
little useful that, in the small town of Stanbridge, Mass., in 
two years the Baptists lost about four hundred dollars um 
justly. In 1752 all Baptist Churches were excluded even 
from the power of giving certificates to their own members 
until they had got a document, signed by three other Bap- 
tist Churches, that they were conscientiously Anabaptists^ 
or 7'ebaptizers^ ^vhich of course all such denied. In 1708 
a law was made by Avhich the proprietors could lay a tax 
upon all the lands for the support of the town minister. 
And in 1770 three hundred and ninety-eight acres of land, 
owned by Baptists, were sold to pay this tax. A single 
trial the year before had cost two hundred and fifty dollars. 
In fine they were subjected to great vexations and injustice. 

To meet this, the Baptists of Rhode Island, New York, 
and Philadelphia, appointed committees of remonstrance 
to raise money, relieve their persecuted brethren, and to 
awaken a spirit in flxvor of perfect liberty of conscience and 
the separation of Church and State. Isaac Backus, the 
general agent of the Baptists for this purpose, was one 
whose name will always be remembered in the history of 
^ Backus, p. 186. 



64 COKTINENTAL COXGP.ESS, 17 74. 

this struggle for the abihty and zeal ^ith Trhich he united 
the whole influence of the denomination in favor at once of 
ci\Tl and rehgious freedom, most usefully to the cause of 
both/ 

Tlie first Continental Congress ever held was m 1774, in 
Philadelphia, two years before the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. It had not been m session ten days before these 
comittees, as representatives of the denommation, memorial- 
ized Congress that they united with thek country in de- 
fense of its privileges, and besought them to secure at 
once the recognition of the inalienable rights of conscience. 
Committees were aj^pomted, and the whole subject was dis- 
cussedrT\ith much earnestness. If no unmediate result fol- 
lowed, the final efiect fully reahzed the most sanguine hojDes. 
For a time one of the leadmg men of Massachusetts, on his 
return from the Congress, endeavored to use the matter to 
excite popular prejudice agamst the BajDtists. But it failed, 
and only showed that the matter had not dropped before 
the Contmental Congress until the four delegates from Mas- 
sachusetts had pledged themselves " to use their influence 
in favor of the religious hberty" the Baptists there con- 
tended for. And when, at the meeting of the Provincial 
Congress of Massachusetts shortly afterward, the Baptists 
presented themselves and requested to realize the good ef- 
fect of this influence, the following resolution was adopted, 
which the great change of pojDular feeling fully endorsed : 

"Ix Provixcial Coxgress, December 9, It 74. 
" On reading the memorial of the Rev. Isaac Backus, agent 
to the Baptist Churches in this Government, 

" Resolved^ That the establishment of civil and religious 
1 HUdi'eth, vol. il p. 577. 



CHURCH ANT> STATE MASSACHUSETTS. 55 

liberty to each denomination in the province is the sincere 
wish of this Congress ; but being by no means vested with 
powers of civil government, whereby they can redress the 
grievances of any person whatever, they therefore recom- 
mend to the Baptist Churches that when a General Assem- 
bly shall be convened in this Colony, they lay the real 
grievances of said churches before the same ; when and 
where their petition will most certainly meet with all that 
attention due to the memorial of a denomination of Chris- 
tians so well disposed to the public weal of their country. 
" By order of the Congress, 

" John Hais^cock, President." 

Accordingly the Baptists memorialized the next session 
of the Massachusetts Legislature, 1775. In doing so they 
said, "Our real grievances are, that we, as well as our 
fathers, have from time to time been taxed on religious ac- 
counts where we were not represented, and our causes have 
been tried by interested judges. JF(j7' a civil Legislature to 
impose religious taxes^ is^ we conceive^ a poioer which their 
constituents never had to give^ and therefore going entirely 
out of their jurisdiction. We are persuaded that an entire 
freedom from being taxed by civil rulers to religious wor- 
ship is not a mere favor from any man or men in the world, 
but a right and property granted us by God, who commands 
us to stand fast in it. We should wrong our consciences 
by allowing that power to men which we believe belongs 
only to God." 

This memorial was debated and referred to a committee, 
who reported favorably, and a bill was brought in, read 
once, and a time set for its second readhig ; but beuig 
crowded out by other business, the Baptists were shuffled 



5Q 



C02^STITUTI0:?sr OF THE U:^^ITED STATES. 



for a time out of what none now pretended to be other than 
just, and the last rehcs of Church and State were not abol- 
ished m Massachusetts until 1832. 

But it was thus the Baptists defended this great princi- 
ple in the formmg period of the national mind and character. 
The Quakers sympathized in their prhiciples, and their 
weight in Philadelphia was great, but the influence of the 
Baptists was more conspicuous from the active part they 
took, as chaplains, and soldiers, and advocates of the Revo- 
lutionary struggle. By the time of the close of the war of 
Independence, the prmciples of religious liberty had become 
almost national. In 1787 the act for the government of 
the North-west Territory provided that " no person should 
ever be molested on account of his mode of worship or re- 
ligious sentiment in the said Territory." Nothing, how- 
ever, had been done by Congress to secure religious liberty 
elsewhere. In August, 1789, therefore, a committee of the 
Baptist Churches in Virginia presented an address to Gen- 
eral Washington wherein they expressed a high regard for 
him, but '' a fear that our religious rights were not well se- 
cured in our new Constitution of government." In answer 
to this he assured them of his readiness to use his influence 
to make these rights indisputable, declaring that the relig- 
ious society of which they were members had been "through- 
out America uniformly the persevering promoters of the 
glorious Revolution." In the following month, accordingly, 
an amendment to the Constitution was passed declaring thatl 
Congress should " make no law respecting any establish- 
ment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." * 
Thus vras the whole weight of the example of the general 
government thrown against all religious establishments, and 
1 Backus, chap. 12. 



EELIGIOUS LIBERTY IN THE UNITED STATES. 57 

its influence secured in favor of the free exercise of the 
conscience on all such matters. 

About this time, i. 6. 1788, the Presbyterian Church of the 
United States adopted a " Form of Government," in which 
they fully and distinctly express themselves in favor of per- 
fect liberty of conscience, and the complete separation of 
Church and State. 

Up to this time all governments, and nearly all men, 
however pious, had feared that if religion were left without 
other support than the free choice of the worshipers, it 
would decline. Nor was it any confidence in the purity of 
human nature that had led Baptists, so long before, to con- 
tend for an unrestrained conscience ; rather was it a strong 
sense of the want which all men feel of just such a system 
as the Gospel to meet their deepest necessities, and to heal 
the diseases of the soul. It was not that they w^ere indif- 
ferent to religion or to truth, but because they knew that 
while the sword of the magistrate might produce hypocrites, 
it could never make Christians. It was not even that they 
grudged tithes, but because they relied on the power of re- 
Ugion to support worship, and felt it an injury and an insult 
to conscience to make men pay for systems in which they 
did not believe. It was not that they despised human gov- 
ernments, but because they honored the government and 
authority of God, that they denied the jurisdiction of the 
magistrate in matters of religion. At the present day, no 
principles are so familiar to all ears, and so responded to by 
all hearts, through the length and breadth of this land. 
They spread with the principles of American independence, 
were incorj^orated in the Constitution of the Union, and 
now belong, without important practical exceptions, to each 

of the States. 

3* 



58 RELIGIOUS LIBERTY IN EUROPE. 

The elements of nature are oftentimes most powerfully 
at work when most silent ; and it was by quiet mfluences 
upon the colonies, such as - have been portrayed, from the 
times of Roger Williams to those of the Revolutionary 
struggle, that the principles of religious Hberty became in- 
cor23orated, not only m the statute book of civil law, but in 
the rehgious belief and conscience of the United States, the 
great unwritten creed of American Christianity. The only 
astonishment and difficulty now with many of the readers 
of this work will be to conceive that the rights of conscience 
have ever been doubted and disputed. 

The adoption of the Constitution, with its first amend- 
ment, before quoted, placed the United States foremost of 
all the nations of the earth in recognizing and sustaining 
the great truths of religious Hberty. Its example and influ- 
ence have been more powerful in diffusing these than can 
readily be expressed. Their leaven has worked, and is 
working, among the nations of the earth, and producing 
the most astonishing results. 

In England, until 1829, Dissenters were barely tolerated. 
No man could hold any civil office, or have a seat in Parlia- 
ment, or be even a simple collector of the taxes, Avithout 
communing in the Church of England once a year. Now 
the Dissenters have the largest number of worshipers. It 
is hardly sixty years since the East India ComjDany possessed 
the power, and openly used it, of j^reventing missionaries 
from sailing in English vessels for their possessions, sup2X>rt 
ing the native idolatries, and assuming to froA\Ti on an(3 
frustrate all attempts at conversion. Now this is abolishedi] 
The Test and Corporation Acts even have been repealed j 
the Union of Church and State is every year gi^iing way a^ 
some new point ; Canada is secularizing the Church land^ 



EELIGIOUS LIBERTY IK EUROPE. 59 

with the consent of the home government, and the Dis- 
senters are being admitted into the Universities. If the 
Madiai are persecuted in Italy, or an Oncken in Germany 
— if, in any part of EurojDe, oppression for conscience' sake 
is carried on, next to America, England is the first to plead 
in behalf of full religious liberty. 

The voice of public opinion is now heard and feared on 
these subjects by all the spiritual tyrants of Europe. Spain 
and Italy have been compelled to abandon the horrors of 
the Inquisition, and those abodes of terror to disgorge their 
prey. The King of Prussia is understood to be setting his 
face against intolerance, and the ministers of the Estab- 
lished Church of that kingdom, no less than its more en- 
lightened members, are beginning to protest against infant 
baptism being compulsory, either to avoid persecutions or 
to secure membership in the Establishment. France has, 
by open proclamation, again and again given the most pub- 
lic and positive assurances of equal religious protection to 
all, and if these assurances are still in a measure violated, it 
is only by temporary intrigues of the Jesuits, which sooner 
or later will bring their own retribution. 

At this moment the Mohammedan empire, whose persecut- 
ing sword used to be the horror and scourge of Christen- 
dom, has entered into a treaty with France and England 
guaranteeing throughout its wide dominions perfect religious 
liberty, and England is understood to be seeking the recog- 
nition of the rights of conscience as a part of the law of 
nations. In Burmah, where, thirty years ago, Judson was 
persecuted well-nigh to death, religious liberty is now fully 
enjoyed. In China an cncroaclmient upon this great right 
produced the rising of that free party which is now so 
rapidly diffusing the name, at least, of Christ, and many 



60 CONVERTED CHUKCIl-MEMBEESHIP. 

principles of His religion through that vast empij-e. In- 
deed, the leader of that movement is one who for months 
studied Christianity under a Baptist missionary at Canton, 
and, it is said, even applied for baptism, hut was refused. 
Thus far, at least, has the Avhole world been coming round 
to these great truths, first embodied, vindicated, and main- 
tained by the Baptists. Except the Russian dominions, 
there is hardly a country of importance in the Avorld that 
has not felt the power of this principle. Progress has 
been made which a hundred years ago would have been 
impossible to anticipate ; and from America :to Chma, from 
England to India, doctrines of rehgious liberty have been 
carried home to the hearts of many millions. 



CHAPTBE III. 

A CONVERTED CHURCH -MEMBERSHIP. 

Nothing will more forcibly impress the mind of a j^ious 
American, traveling in Europe, than the diiferent religious 
atmospheres inhaled by the masses on the two sides of the 
Atlantic. It is a great difference that he will feel when he 
enters a Protestant as distinct from a Roman Catholic 
State. But there is a more striking distinction between 
American Christianity, as a whole, and that of the continent 
of Euro^DC, where Church Establishments are in every coun- 
try. Here a man's religious professions are the result of 
personal conviction ; there they appear so uniformly as the 
effect of the law, routine, or instruction, as seldom to imply 
earnest hidividual piety at all. Not that devotion is lacking 
in Europe ; but simply that the most religious do not pro- 



ROMAN CATHOLIC PROGRESS. 61 

fess more than others, those utterly destitute of it being en- 
titled to become its professors and its ministers as much as 
any others. Dr. Baird has observed that he found the most 
intelligent persons in Europe quite at a loss to comprehend 
this different feature of Christianity in the two continents.^ 
Among all classes of Americans, however pious or however 
worldly, and as a general thing, of whatever denommation, 
the conviction seems natural that a man does not become a 
Christian merely in consequence of being born in a particular 
State, or inducted in infancy into a nominal connection with 
some church, but by personal choice and earnest religious 
character. All through Europe, except among certain small, 
well-marked evangelical denominations, the idea is current 
that every one born in a Christian land must be considered 
a member of the National Church, no matter Avhat his 
private belief or character. 

Here public sentiment, and the unwritten Christianity 
of the country, seem to suggest instinctively that none 
ought to be received as full members of any church, or re- 
garded as true Christians, mth whom sound moraUty and 
steady piety is not a matter of established personal influence 
and supremacy. We are not unaware that there are several 
exceptions to this spirit ; and in some cases a settled pur- 
pose is evident to resist what is esteemed an American in- 
fluence encroaching into the domain of rehgion. In tlie 
Roman Catholic Church, for instance, this determination is 
most strongly manifested on the part of most of tlie s^m-itual 
guides ; and yet to any one brought up Avitli Papists in 
Europe, the general change of sentiment among the laity in 
this direction, wliich by degrees manifests itself, is greater 
than could possibly have been expected. Roman Catliolic- 
* Eeligion in America, book v. chap. 4. 



62 PEOGEESS IN THE EPISCOPAL CHUECH. 

ism not only loses its hold on multitudes who come to this 
country, but it is altogether a diiferent thing for those who 
remain in its communion from what it is either m Europe, 
or in Mexico, or in Canada. As when one who has long 
lived in a flat country, climbing a mountain top on a clear 
day, feels by the play of his lungs that the atmospheric 
pressure is not the same, and that he breathes a different 
air ; so now even a Roman Catholic on commg to this 
country finds himself in a perfectly new religious atmosphere, 
one that has in it the pressure of a greater and more direct 
jDersonal responsibility. The priest is no longer the mere 
tool of the bishop, nor the layman of the priest. It is not 
shnply that both are more free, but also that both have a 
stronger sense of direct j^ersonal responsibility to God ; not 
simply that the layman will not perform what he considers 
an arbitrary penance, but that he will claim his right to 
read the Word of God. And probably more Bibles are 
circulated and read by the Roman Catholics in this country 
than in any, perhaps, of all the countries of Europe. Large 
numbers of copies of the Douay version are freely to be ob- 
tained A^dth the approbation of the priests themselves. 

This silent change, giving to every man's religion a closer 
personal character, is also manifested in its degree in the 
E2Discopal Church. So long as it Avas a national institution, 
it was necessary that it should admit every one to its priv- 
ileges, and in England to this day the laws compel a cler- 
gyman to administer the communion to all baptized in 
infancy, and without reference to personal character, pro- 
vided they are not proved to be scandalous offenders. The 
trouble and expense of establishing this proof are so great 
as to leave even the most pious minister very little power 
to withhold tliis official testimonial of the communion of the 



THE MERCEKSBUKG SCHOOL. 63 

Churcli. By the same law, however neglectful they may 
have been of every voluntary mark of Christian character, 
he is compelled to proclaim them when they die his be- 
loved brethren Avho have " departed this life in sure and 
certain hope of a joyful resurrection." 

But in this country the entire separation of the Church 
from the State has produced a very marked alteration and 
improvement in the character of the Episcopal Church. It 
is not merely that there is a vast increase of lay power, but 
a deeper sense of personal interest and responsibility rest- 
ing upon the communicants as a class. So it is not a matter 
of simple form and routine for their young people on arriv- 
ing at a certain age to be confirmed and partake of the com- 
munion, but to a greater extent than heretofore those only 
whose hearts are touched with a pei^onal and supreme 
interest in religion receive the symbols. True, all this im- 
provement is rather in practice than in theory, and the ten- 
dency among the clergy in some sections has been of late 
years to magnify and restore an exploded reverence for a 
merely ritual religion. Yet this is a movement with which 
the masses of the people of that denomination have but 
little sympathy. But some kind of knowledge and earnest 
regard for religion, some indications of personal piety are 
required more generally than ever before, while in many of 
the Churches their ministers preach the doctrines of the 
new birth and Christian conflict with the utmost clearness ; 
nor would they think of recommending the people of their 
(charge to appear at the table of the Lord without the evi- 
dences of conversion. 

In the German Reformed Church, Drs. ^evin and Schaff, 
of the Mercersburg Sc^liool, may contend that it is an error 
to attempt to have a Church below composed wholly of 



64 THE BAPTISTS. 

those savingiy converted to God ; but this agam is rather 
the effort of a few of the clergy to bring back thek people 
to a state of things current a hundred years ago, and in 
Europe, than a nioYement generally sustamed by the 
Churches. It is, in fact, an effort to gah^anize new hfe into 
mfant baptism. But the great mass of the reformed denom- 
mations in this country, of German origin, now hold to the 
propriety of requirmg personal faith jDrior to full commun- 
ion. The great numerical bulk of American Churches are 
imited on the same j^omt of a voluntary and converted 
Church membership. So ^ide-spread indeed is the con- 
viction that unconverted persons should not be communi- 
cants, that very few of them would think it right to par- 
take if invited. Denomhiations seem to be unpopular in 
proj)ortion as they favor an unconverted membership. 
All of them, includmg Roman CathoHcs, Unitarians, and 
even Episcoj^ahans, are sho^oi by the last census to em- 
brace not above a sixth of the whole Church-going popu- 
lation. Xow it is, if we mistake not, this wide-spread con- 
viction that Christianity does not consist in forms and 
ceremonies, but in the personal surrender of the heart to 
God, and that the converted alone should be communicants, 
which constitutes the great superiority of American over 
European Christianity.^ 

But however sunple, clear, and natural all this may now 
ap23ear, it was not so a hundred years ago. At that time 
the Ba23tists stood alone, the only denomination in this 
country that made a credible profession of personal piety 
a pre-requisite to their communion. It was then generally 
esteemed a Baptist peculiarity. It is so treated by Knapp 
m his Theology.^ He admits that the Novations, Dona- 
1 See Baird's Relig. in America, b. v. c. 4. '^ Sect. 135, 2, and 141, 2. 



THE METHODISTS. 65 

tists, Waldenses, Wickliffites, and Hussites, also held it, and 
that their labors " had, upon the whole, a mighty beneficial 
effect ;" that " in times of ignorance and unbelief they 
have been the depositories of uncorrupted Christianity," and 
that "without them the Reformation would never have 
taken place." Yet he mamtains, in common with most of 
the Pedobaptists of Europe, that "the external visible 
Church can not be a society consisting of pious Christians 
only, but rather a nursery designed to raise up many for 
the invisible Kingdom." 

A hundred years ago, except Whitefield, discarded as a 
" new light," there was scarcely an evangelical preacher to 
be found in the Episcopal Church in this country, or one 
who considered any thing more as necessary to regeneration 
or to make a man a Christian, than the baptism of his infancy. 

It was not until within seventy years that the Methodists, 
now so efficient in evangelical labors, considered themselves 
as other than a mere converted society in an imconverted 
Church, from which they received the communion, and with 
which they identified themselves. They have therefore not 
unnaturally borrowed many expressions and views from the 
Church of England. Even John Wesley tried hard to up- 
hold its teachings, on the subject of Baptismal regeneration, 
in lan^ua2:e which no Methodist now teaches.^ Their stand- 
ard writers^ regard baptism as the entrance of the visible 
Church. But by a happy inconsistency, produced by their 
evangelical preachmg, they do not now seem to admit that 
persons ought to be complete members until after conver- 
sion. The language of their book of Discipline is, however, 
not decisive,^ and " seekers" are often urged to partake of 

1 See Wesley's Miscellaneous Works, vol. ii. pp. 15*7, 8. 

2 See Watson's Theology, vol. ii. pp. 595, 626. ^ Chapter ii. sec. 2. 



66 ARCHIBALD ALEXANDER. 

the communion as a suitable means of grace to tins 
day. 

Among the Presbyterians it is just about a hundred years 
since Gilbert Tennent was fomidiug Princeton Seminary to 
educate evangelical mhiisters. At that time, so- far from 
conversion being esteemed necessary to full communion, it 
was a matter of formal discussion whether it was proper to 
require the credible profession of a change of heart in 
the ministry, and considered that it was not. At the present 
tune, no body of Christians are more clear and judicious 
upon this point than the Presbyterians, both those of the 
old and those of the new school. Yet even now there is 
nothing in their confession of faith to prevent the reception 
of unconverted persons as communicants. The Established 
Church of Scotland, with a similar confession, does not re- 
quire conversion. The change, then, is one in the spirit of 
the people, or the age, not in the constitution of their 
churches, or the text of their laws, and at the time to Avhich 
we refer, the Tennents were jeered at as "new lights," and 
mere enthusiasts. To this day, their form of government^ 
declares that all their bajDtized are members of the Church, 
and " are bound to perform all the duties of church mem- 
bers." Thus it is quite clear that however evangelical tliis 
excellent body of Christians may now be in practice, theu' 
Confession, and, above all, their infant baptism, have an oppo- 
site tendency, dra^\dng them back toward a system which 
w^ould mtroduce the world mto the Church, by making the 
terms of admission too regardless of personal piety. 

In the life of the late venerable Dr. Archibald Alexander, 
of Princeton, is found a record by himself of the struggles 
through which his mind passed on the subject of infant 
1 Book ii. of Discipline, chap. 1. 



PEOGKESS AMOKG PKESB YTEKI ANS. 67 

baptism. It refers to a period while lie was President of 
Hampden Sidney College, Virginia, from 1797 to 1799, 
about ten or twelve years before his appointment to the 
more important post he so long and so honorably filled at 
the head of the Princeton Theological Seminary. " About 
this time," he says, " I fell mto doubts respectmg the au- 
thority of infant baptism. The origin of these doubts was 
in too rigid notions as to the purity of the Churchy mth a 
behef that receiving infants had a corruptmg tendency. I 
communicated my doubts very freely to my friend Mr. Lyle, 
and to Mr. Speece (Presbyterian ministers, who were his 
assistants in the college), and found that they both had been 
troubled by the same. We talked much privately on the 
subject, and often conversed with others in hope of getting 
some new light. At length Mr. Lyle and I determined to 
give up the practice of baptizing infants until we should re- 
ceive more light. This determination we publicly commu- 
nicated to our people (churches in the vicinity which they 
statedly supplied as pastors), and left them to take such 
measures as they deemed expedient." We may hereafter 
notice the rest of the remarks by Dr. Alexander. At 
present we desire only to quote this to show that a belief 
in the " corrupting tendency of infant baptism led Dr. A. at 
one time very seriously to think and speak of "joining the 
Baptists," and that he could not get rid of these impressions 
without lowering his views " as to the purity of the Church." 
He intimates in fact that the Baptist notions on the subject 
are "too rigid." We have been happy to believe that our 
Presbyterian brethren have now practically adopted the 
principle of admitting to full communion those only who 
give credible evidence of personal piety. This is what Bap- 
ists have ever mamtained, and we should be sorry to learn 



68 CONGEEGATIOIN-ALISTS. 

that the denoimiiation of which Dr. A. was so distinguished 
an ornament had abandoned it. 

A hundred years ago, nearly all the Congregational 
Churches of Massachusetts were passing through the dark- 
est part of that cloud which drove off ultimately so many 
into Unitarianism. For sixty or seventy years longer, it 
overwhelmed with confusion all attempts to establish the 
denomination on the basis of a converted membership. 
That rare and holy man, Jonathan Edwards, was dismissed 
from his church at I^orthampton, Massachusetts, for no other 
reason than the maintenance of these very views, and was, 
at the time of which we speak, labormg in exile, on this ac- 
count, among the Xorth American Indians. The teachings 
of Edwards, Whitefield, and the Tennents, which had led to 
''the great awakening," had also j^roduced the desire in 
many quarters that th^ system then current of admittmg 
all persons of reputable life, who had been sprinkled m hi- 
fancy, to the communion-table, should be abandoned. Sev- 
eral churches had adopted Edwards' views, but the great 
body were opposed to them. 

Large numbers of these "new lights," as they were 
stigmatized, became Baptists, however, on this very account. 
All the way between Massachusetts and Georgia, no other 
denomination held this principle of church-membership ; nor 
was it until within about thirty years, that the Congrega- 
tionalists became completely separated from the Unitarians, 
and the most fundamental part of their present constitution 
came to be a feature of their denominational character. Dr. 
Baird has shown that Unitarianism origmally grew out of a 
dislike to the practice of requiring evidence of piety in can- 
didates for admission to the churches.^ 

^ Religion in America, book vii. chap. 3. 



UI^ITAEIAN VIEWS. 69 

In 1790 there was but one Congregational Church in 
Boston that maintained orthodox views ; and so cold had it 
become as to be unable to keep up any prayer-meeting. 
When its lamp of piety was well-nigh extinguished, it was 
the zeal incidentally imparted to those noble and struggling 
brethren at a Baptist Church that rekindled the smolder- 
ing fire in a Church '' beloved for their fathers' sakes." 
Thus in due time they were enabled to throw off the incu- 
bus which had so long paralyzed their movements. But in 
1812 all but two of these churches were still Unitarian. 

The views of our Congregational brethren, therefore, on 
"this subject of the relation of the baptized to the visible 
^churches, have been extremely unsettled and contradictory 
^at different periods, and in the view of different authorities. 
*The Supreme Court of Massachusetts holds that part of the 
! communicants with which the majority of the parish concur, 
■ to be " the Church," and on this decision Unitarians now 
'hold many houses of worship and endowments. This must 
^have been upon the principle that the children, being bap- 
tized, are a part of the Church. Infant baptism has always 
- been held by them to produce some kind of connection with 
' it, though precisely what, it is hard to define. Or rather, 
^ it has been with them, as with many other denominations, 
' at those periods in which piety has shone the brightest, the 
' effect of infant baptism has been least perceptible, while in 
proportion as personal religion has declined, the value put 
upon the ceremony has increased. For the first thirty years 
after the landing of the Pilgrims, none of those baptized in 
' infancy were, in most of the churches, admitted to the com- 
' munion, or other privileges of membership, imtil they pro- 
fessed perspnal piety. But in 1657, a Synod was called in 
Boston to consider this matter, in special reference to the 



70 PROGEESS OF BAPTIST VIEWS. 

right of voting in the to^\Ti meetings — a poHtical franchise, 
yet permitted only to Church members. They decided thai 
the baptized, as such, ought to be considered members of 
the Church, under its disciphne, and shouki be admitted to 
all the privileges except communion. Even this last prerog 
ative^ was generally accorded to them a few years latere 
About a hundred and fifty churches having been thus le( 
off into Unitarianism, the orthodox Congregationalisti 
have, amid a variety of theories, turned practically to th( 
plan of admitting to church-privileges such only as givi 
credible evidence of conversion. Dr. Bushnell, in his worl 
on Christian Nurture, no less than Dr. Nevins, has clearlj 
shoAvn that the Congregationalists have never had any well 
settled theory as to the precise relations of the baptized tc 
the Church ; but that the views of Edwards and their pres 
ent course are essentially " Baptist in theory," and ought tc 
lead those who hold them to become so in fact. The sim^ 
pie principle of believers' baptism naturally makes a credi 
ble profession of personal piety pre-requisite to visible 
church-membership ; and it has been in a very great meaa 
ure the l^ld and fearless manner in which our fathers up 
held this truth by preaching and by practice, by which the! 
whole Christian world has been so greatly reformed, and 
the religious sentiment of the country changed in its favor. 
It has been worth all the prayers, struggles, and suffer- 
mgs which it has cost, to effect what has been accom- 
plished. What Baptist can look back upon the last century, 
and view the great change wrought in j^nblic opinion, and 
in all the prevailing denommations, Tvithout being ready to 
exclaim, " What hath God wrought ?" Never, perhaps, in 
the history of the Church, has the great truth of a convert- 
ed church-membership been so clearly taught as at the 



PKOGRESS IK EUKOPE. 71 

present day. It is spreading on every side. Where mis- 
sions are established by the evangehcal denominations 
abroad, it is planted, and none are admitted as communi- 
cants until they give evidence of being personally and sav- 
ingly interested in the truths of the Gospel. In England 
this principle has an entire ascendency among the evangeli- 
cal Dissenters, and in all their missions, while many of the 
"Episcopalians uphold it in all but practice, and through the 
circulation of such tracts as those of Leigh Richmond and 
others, spread it among all classes, and indeed all nations. 
In France and Switzerland, the writings of Merle D'Au- 
bigne, and men of that theological school, open it to the 
large classes of readers. Throughout a large part of Ger- 
many, Denmark, and Sweden, it is spreading through the 
labors of men like Oncken and his associates. While in 
Prussia, the present King, as head of the National Church, 
has within a few months issued a document of much signifi- 
cance, announcing his " determination to place his inherited 
authority" in the hands of " apostolically-formed churches ;" 
that is, as he goes on to explain, " churches of small appa- 
rent size, in each of which the life, the order, and the offices 
of the Universal Church are brought into activity, in short 
[ independent self-increasing creations, by which, as with liv- 
ing stones, the Apostles of' the Lord commenced building." 
Doubtless the researches and communications of such men 
. as Neander and Bunsen, no less than those of Oncken, have 
in part produced these salutary convictions. 
j It is a pleasant and a glorious thing to see human learn- 
( ing and power coming round at length to concede and to 
^ support, in the very same terms, what for centuries our 
fatliei's have contended and suffered for all over the world, 
J i. c., that every true Church of God is built up of lively 



1^2 PBOGEESS IN EUEOPE. 

Stones a spiritual hotxse. Far be it from us to undervalue 
the labors and principles of all other evangelical Christians 
hi brmging about a healthy state of reUgious ophiion on 
this unportant point. Every sermon preached on regenera- 
tion has contributed to this result. But to us it seems clear 
that if the evangehcal rehgion of other denominations is m 
favor of the truth m question, the practices of Pedobaptists 
are essentially opposed to it. In a ^vord, Baptists alone can 
consistently advocate a church-membership composed ex- 
clusively of those who make a credible profession of per- 
sonal piety. It is necessary for the sake of their other 
principles. But aU Pedobaptists hold it only by a happy 
inconsistency ^^-ith theirs. For if infant baptism does not 
entitle its recipients to become visible church-members, 
what does it effect ? Just now all this may be caUed the 
popular sentiment of the whole country, but the time might 
soon come, should the practice of infant baptism remam, 
when all should retrograde. This, the late declension of 
evangehcal sentiments in the Episcopal Church, and the 
wi-itings of the Mercersburg School, mdicate but too plainly 
Dr. Baird, m his "Religion in America," represents many per 
sons in Em-ope as utteriy unable to comprehend the relation 
which the children of pious parents sustain to the churches 
in this country. He speaks of it as one practicaUy "mvisible" 
in aU evangelical communions, and presses, as the advantage 
accruing, that the imconverted " occupy their proper place." 
Thus on the one hand infant baptism is perpetually draW; 
ing aU these churches into the vortex of a mere ritual reUg 
ion, while on the other, evangehcal truth, so far as it pre 
vails, leads the people to become, as Dr. Nevin and Dr 
Bushnell both show, " Baptist in theory^ even where thej 
neglect to become so in practice. 



SAFETY OF UII^BAPTIZED INFANTS. 73 



CHAPTEE IV. 

SACRAMENTS INOPEEATIYE WITHOUT CHOICE AND FAITH. 

Chevalier Bunsen in his work called " Hippolytus and 
his Age," ^ says, " The superstition that such children of 
Christian parents as die of tender age, unbaptized, are under 
damnation, fi^om which they must be rescued by baptism, 
IS to be put down forever." That is, we suppose, if it can 
be, while the practice of mfant baptism is retained. We 
may grant that well-informed persons have by degrees given 
up the idea in question, but this has been because they have 
become wiser than the system which, as Coleridge has 
shown, naturally implies it. A century ago there were few 
Pedobaptists probably, in any denomination, who did not 
suppose that baptism rendered the infant more safe. At 
that time there was among them all a strong tendency to 
regard both the ordinances of our religion as good Avorks 
to be performed as means to procure grace and conversion^ 
rather than as expression, of a faith already living. We 
have traced in the last chapter the extent to which a more 
appropriate view has come to be taken of the Lord's Sup- 
per, and the steps by which this change has been brought 
about ; so that now the bulk of evangelical Christians re- 
gj^rd it as the appropriate symbol, but not the meritorious 
paeans or procuring cause of true faith. It is difficult to 
eonceive why this change of views should not be extended 
to both ordinances — why those who are not esteemed fit for 
one should yet be regarded as proper subjects for the 
other. To refuse the Lord's Supper to the unconverted, 

I Yol. iii. p. 212. 
4 



74 SACRAMEKTS VITALIZED BY FAITH. 

and yet to include them T\dtlim the pale of the visible 
Church by baptism, is an inconsistency that can not stand. 
Time ^ill soon kill it, if it does not die in any other way. 
We know that of the multitudes who now practice mfant 
baptism, comparatively few in this country believe baptismal 
regeneration ; but it is not so in Europe ; and in proportion 
as any utility whatever is attached to it, both the necessity 
and the power of something other than personal faith to 
make the condition " more safe" is presupposed. In this 
way the ceremony cuts at the root of the great doctrine and 
work of the Reformation. Let any one read the thirteenth 
article of the EjDiscopal Church in relation to good works 
before justification, and say if, by every fan- rule of inter- 
pretation, infant baptism does not stand in opposition to its 
principles. 

The blood which goes into the lungs a dark inert mass, 
poisoned with carbonic acid, comes from them of a bright 
scarlet, lia^dng parted m^its poison and absorbed the oxy- 
gen of the atmosphere. It is thus vitalized, and made 
capable of sustaining hfe. So m the gospel the sacraments 
need to be vitahzed by a livmg Faith, in the exiDcrience 
of each professor, without which they only carry with them 
poison and death into every ramification of the spiritual 
system to which they extend. 

If any one doubt the tendency of infant baptism to in- 
fuse a poisonous mfluence into even the most evangelical 
creed, let him but notice the terms in whicli it is sjDoken of in 
all Protestant symbols. The Lutheran Confession drawn up 
by Melancthon, approved by Luther, and adopted by the 
Diet of Augsburg, " the mother symbol of the Reformation," 
as it has been termed, says (Art. 9), concerning baptism, that 
" it is necessary to salvation," and that " children are to be 



BAPTISMAL REGENERATION. ^5 

baptized who, being offered unto God in baptism, are re- 
ceived into the favor of God." It condemns the Anabap- 
tists " who prohibit the baptism of children, and affirm that 
they can be saved without baptism." In Luther's Cate- 
chism, it is expressly taught in words, that " by its effects 
our sins are forgiven, our souls are delivered from the 
power of death and Satan ; and eternal happiness is be- 
stowed on all who believe that God means to do all that 
He has said and promised." The Augsburg Confession is 
to this day the standard of the Lutherans and Moravians ; 
it has been adopted by the major part of Protestant Eu- 
rope, on the Continent, and its language in this respect, is 
fully sustained by the Confessions of Bohemia, Saxony, 
Wurtembeg, Helvetia and Sueveland. 

In the Episcopal Churches of England and of America, 
immediately before the baptism of each child, it is solemnly 
prayed that the " infant coming to holy baptism may re- 
ceive remission of sin by spiritual regeneration;" and 
again, " Sanctify this water to the mystical washing away 
of sins ;" while the parents are immediately afterward sent 
back with the assurance that "this child is regenerated 
and grafted into the body of Christ's Church," and are called 
upon to give thanks to God that "it hath pleased Him to 
regenerate him with His Holy Spirit, to receive him for His 
own child by adoption, and to incorporate him into His 
holy Church." Even the well-known Mr. Melville, while 
pleading for a further " daily renewal," yet says, " we be- 
heve it to be specially and through the sacrament of bap- 
tism that the Holy Ghost acts in renovating the nature 
which became corrupt through the apostasy." "We 
really think that no fair, no straightforward dealing can get 
rid of the conclusion that the Church holds what is called 



76 BAPTISMAL REGENERATION. 

baptismal regeneration. You may dislike the doctrine, you 
may msh it expunged from the prayer-book, but so long 
as I subscribe to that prayer-book, and so long as I officiate 
according to the forms of that prayer-book I do not see 
how I can be commonly honest and yet deny that every 
baptized person is on that account regenerate."^ 

Such are the views of the evangelical Melville, repub- 
lished in this country mthin a few years, and endorsed by 
Bishop M'llvaine. 

In the Methodist Church, the form for the baptism of in- 
fants happily omits the above sentiments, thus showing their 
sense of their obvious incongruity with evangelical religion. 
In the Doctrinal Tracts, however, published a few years ago 
by the Methodist authorities m this country, is a Treatise by 
Mr. Wesley fuU of the baptismal regeneration of infants, 
and declaring that " m the ordmary way they can not be 
saved unless original sin be washed away in baptism ;" that 
by it " we who are by nature children of wrath are made 
children of God ;" and that " by water as a means we are 
regenerated and born again." 

"Now this language of Mr. Wesley was wi'itten rather 
less than a hundred years ago. We are happy to feel as- 
sured that very few, if any, of our Methodist brethren be- 
lieve it now. But it belongs naturally to the system of in- 
fant baptism, and thus has been in a measure thoughtlessly 
transferred in a form used by them to this day in the bap- 
tism of adults. " We call upon Thee for these persons that 
they, coming to Thy holy haptism^ may receive remission of 
their sins by spiritual regeneration." It is difficult to know 
what a Methodist imnister would do in case a person should 

1 Melville's Sermons, the Spirit* on the Waters, volume iL page 
306. 



PRESBYTERIAN VIEW CONGREGATIONAL 77 

say to Mm, " I seek baptism because I have been regenerat- 
ed and my sins are forgiven." 

In the confession of the Presbyterian Chm'ch, baptism is 
declared to be " generally necessary to salvation." And as 
this with them usually means infant baptism, we have here 
sacraments regarded as efficacious without faith in the recip- 
ient ; acting, therefore, necessarily by an opus operatiim^ 
"generally necessary to salvation." If this were true, how 
many a parents' heart might be lacerated if his child died 
without baptism. We may smile at all these as now obso- 
lete ideas, which they unquestionably are, among the best 
informed in this country, but hardly among the numerical 
majority, even here, of those who practice this rite, and 
certainly not in Europe. But a hundred years ago these 
confessions of faith represented fairly the state of the cur- 
rent belief Nor are there lacking many attempts to revive 
such opinions in the most influential quarters now. What 
can we think of Dr. ISTevin, for instance, declaring that the 
Church " makes us Christians by the sacrament of holy bap- 
tism, which she always held to be of supernatural force for 
this very purpose." ^ 

The opinions of our Congregational brethren are exceed- 
ingly various and doubtful. Some of them seem, m former 
times, to have followed Calvin in the idea that it accrued 
only to the benefit of the elect infants who received it. Dr. 
Stoddard, of Northampton, held that the sacraments are to 
be regarded as means of grace offered to all who hold the 
Christian faith and maintain a correct life without any refer- 
ence to a change of heart. Dr. Bushneir speaks clearly in 
regard to the contradictory opinions that have been held on 

^ " Christian Nurture," p. 97. 

" Arguments for Christian Nurture, p. 60. 



78 CONGREGATION-AL YIEW OF Il^FAKT BAPTISM. 

this subject by the N'ew England divmes. As a Congrega- 
tionahst, writmg at the present day, he shows the progress 
of what he would cheerfully admit to be Baptist views, as 
A^dll be evident on examination/ Probably when Edwards 
wrote, the Congregationahsts of N^ew England would all 
have agreed to this, a ground not uncommonly held noAV, 
that infant baptism in some way renders the condition of 
the child who dies in infancy " more safe." It must mean 
all this if it mean any thmg. And this Coleridge once de- 
clared seemed to him " the strongest argument of all against 
it, namely, that it supposes, and most certainly encourages, 
a belief concernmg a God the most blasphemous and in- 
tolerable," i, 6., that the want of it may occasion their " eter- 
nal loss."'^ In order to avoid this difficulty our Congrega- 
tional brethren have been wont to affirm that baptism does 
not place the children of behevers in the covenant which 
belongs to them by hirth^ it is only the public recognition 
and seal of this covenant. This, however, does not evade 
the difficulty, if their condition, they dying in infancy, is sup- 
posed to be made a whit more safe in consequence of this 
seal. 

In the present day it is difficult for most persons to em- 
brace such a view of the character of God as that expressed 
by Coleridge. Infant baptism is most dangerous to the 
present age, therefore, on accomit of the support it gives 
to the Popish doctrine of an efficacy residing in sacraments 
and the works of others, without any faith of our own. 
Thus it opposes the whole gospel system of regeneration 
by the Spirit, and justification by faith. Kobly was this last 
preached by Luther and his associates at the Reformation ; 
clearly and thoroughly is it preached by our evangelical 

1 Christian Nurture, pp. 60, 90. ^ Coleridges' TVorks, vol. v. p. 192. 



BAPTISMAL EEGENERATION. 79 

brethren, of many different communions, at the present 
day. So far as the Lord's Supper is concerned, Zuingle 
and his followers, at least, held it to be in itself a symbol 
of the body and blood of Christ, and as such useful only 
where it is the expression of faith in Him. This is the view 
that Baptists have ever taken of both the ordinances of the 
Christian religion. They never baptize or admit to the 
Lord's table any who have not previously made a credible 
profession of personal faith. It has thus never been possi- 
ble for them to magnify either of those sacraments into 
saving ordinances. 

But in this they have had to stand alone as a denomina- 
tion. It is true, indeed, that when Luther was pressed by 
the contradiction between justification by faith alone, and 
infant baptism, he, by a stretch of fancy m which few have 
been able to follow him, declared that infants had faith in 
the germ, and therefore were entitled to baptism on that 
account. It has since been administered on the ground of 
the promise of sponsors that they should believe, or on the 
faith of the parents. The custom, however, has always 
proved a part and pillar of Popery, and afforded the most 
effectual of all arguments in favor of the Romish view, and 
against justification by faith alone. The testimony of Bap- 
tists that the faith of the recipient is necessary to render 
sacraments acceptable, is, on this account, important to the 
Church, and all that they demand is readily conceded by 
evangelical Christians when arguing in favor of justification 
by faith. Yet it is lost sight of by them when defending 
infant baptism, while the upholders of sacramental efiicacy 
then stand with consistency upon the natural import of that 
ceremony. Here, indeed, is the point of extreme diverg- 
ence between evangelical religion and the most fatal super- 



80 KORTHBIIITISH REVIEW. 

stition of the Cliurcli of Rome. The Papists contend for 
an efficacy residhig in the sacraments themselves, an opus 
operatum^ and they appeal to infant baptism in proof. And 
it must at last be conceded that it does the child good in 
that manner or not at all. 

It is thus the great prop and pillar of sacramental efficacy 
and all sacerdotalism, wherever it exists, from Cardinal 
Wiseman to the Bishop of Exeter, and li'om him to Dr. Ke- 
vins. " The dogmatic theory of baptism" says the Bishop 
of Exeter, " becomes of necessity the basis of the entire 
scheme of Anglican theology." And the IS^orth British 
Review, the organ of the Free Presbyterian Church of 
Scotland, avows that all this can only be answered by con- 
ceding the entire imscrq^txiralness of inlant baptism: 

" The capital, the fotal objection to the present baptis- 
mal service of the Church of England, is that in no case of 
imconscious mfants can we reasonably suppose that the 
spiritual grace therem implied has been obtained through 
the spiritual qualification of the recipient. If a spiritual 
effect has been produced on the soul of the mfant, it must 
have been produced wholly on man's side by the agency of 
the priest, his outward act has altered the muid of the bap- 
tized person without any consciousness of his own. This is 
a superstition A^ hich contradicts dkectly the very idea of 
Christianity, but it is also the essence of sacerdotalism. It 
is indisputable that if the term regeneration expresses any 
spii'itual effect on the soul, the baptismal service counte- 
nances the sacramental system and the priestly theory. 
And precisely the same result follows also if (as some High 
Churchman who hesitated to ascribe to the sprinkling of the 
baptismal water a transforming power on the soul have 
imagined) the effect of baptism is limited to the washing 



NORTH BKITISH KEVIEW. 81 

away of original sin. This supposition implies that an in- 
fant who had the misfortune of dying before baptism, 
necessarily retains the burden of original guilt, and as Au- 
gustine and many others have believed, falls uncler eternal 
condemnation. How any person, who had obtained the 
faintest insight into the meaning of the Christian religion 
could have brought himself to believe that God consigns an 
unconscious and helpless being to eternal happiness or eter- 
nal misery according as an external and purely mechanical 
operation has been performed upon him by the instrument- 
ality of others is what we have never been able to conceive. 
But certainly if life or death, and that forever, depends on 
an outward rite without the slightest mental concurrence 
on the part of the recipient, the fundamental idea of a 
priesthood, the intervention of a human mediator between 
God and man, is established, sacerdotalism has gained its 
principle, it will have an easy victory over every other im- 
pediment. 

" But, thank God, there is not one word in t]ie ISTew 
Testament which in the slightest degree sanctions so terrible 
a doctrine : we are spared the pain, to say the least, of see- 
ing the Christian Scriptures contradicting their own ideal 
of Christianity. The origin of the mischief is plain. The 
doctrine of the baptismal service is true ; the unconscious- 
ness of the inllmt is the real fons mali. * * * 

'' The language of Scripture regarding baptism implies 
the spiritual act of faith in the recipients. When infant 
baptism is now spoken of, the necessary modification must 
accordingly be made in applying language used by Scripture 
concei-ning spiritual baptism only. Inextricable confusion 
has been the inevitable consequence when language used of 
adults, of persons possessed of intelligence, and capable of 

4* 



82 NOETH BRITISH REVIEW. 

spiritual acts, was gratuitously applied to unconscious in- 
fants." ' 

We feel persuaded that it would be great injustice to 
other evangelical denominations to suppose that now the 
relation of faith to ordmances is not generally preached by 
them. But it is a change which has been produced by the 
vital and irrepressible elements of evangehcal principles 
withm them, counteracting the effects of the Pedobaptist 
principle, and, as we shall show, destroymg, m a great 
measure, Pedobaptism itself. The spirit of the age— the 
spirit of a purely voluntary religion, or rather the progress 
of Baptist sentiments keeps the tendencies of this error in 
check, and reduces it to the msignificant position it just now 
occupies in this country compared mth other countries, and 
in this age compared with other ages. •But in all discussions 
between High Churchmen and Low, those who hold to bap- 
tismal regeneration and those who do not, it is only by dis- 
carding infant baptism tha^ evangehcal truth can be for a 
moment maintained. This 'is conceded as undeniable m 
the article of the " North British Review," from which we 
have before quoted. 

" The non-recognition of the fact that the external rite 
of infant baptism is not the baptism spoken of in Scripture, 
is the source of the palpable wealoiess of Enghsh Low Church- 
men m the discussion of this question. They have reason 
and rehgion on their side, but in the appeal to Scripture 
they are undeniably worsted by their opponents, l^o shift 
will ever help them. The advantage possessed by the High 
Church party rests on the assumption that what is said of 
baptism m Scripture may be equally said of the mfant baptism 
practiced by the Church of England, and nothing but a de- 
1 North British Review, August, 1852, pp. 209, 10. 



BAPTISMAL REGENERATION^. 83 

nial of their complete identity will, or can strip them of this 
advantage. Evangelicals are afraid of looking the truth in 
the face. They are hampered by a superstitious feeling 
about infant baptism, they are afraid of discrediting it, in 
spite of the many excellent reasons which justify its adop- 
tion ; and they are still more afraid of saying that the bap- 
tism of the Church of England is not identical with the 
sj)iritual baptism of the Apostles. So long as they refuse to 
admit the real truth, so long must they be content to carry 
on this all-important controversy at a fearful disadvantage, 
and so long must they continue to experience the bitter 
consequences of the fact, that here the spirit of JPo^yeiy^ 
under one or other of its more specious forms, has, for the 
last three centuries, retained a footing within the very 
stronghold of Protestantism, from which it has never yet 
been dislodged." ^ 

We are not, however, at liberty to sujDpose, from the rapid 
and important, but silent changes of the last century, that 
baj)tismal regeneration is finally dying out, and will struggle 
no more. Error embodied in ordinances and great public 
acts may seem to die for awhile, but it is only like a foe that 
retires from the plain to intrench himself within a fortress. 
A few years ago it was supposed that the Episcopal Church 
was all becoming evangelical, until Puseyism awoke the 
slumbering High Church feeling, and from behind breast- 
works, made but of the rags of gowns and cassocks, recon- 
structed a system of spiritual tyranny and ritual religion, 
worse by far than the better portions of the Church of Rome. 

But if priestly garments formed their temporary sand- 
bags, infant baptism was by them felt to be the main forti- 
fication — the citadel of their whole strength. Thus, for 
' North British Review, August, 1852, p. 211. 



84 IMPORTANCE. OF BAPTIST VIEWS. 

instance, in " Tracts for the Times," ISTo. 67, the author, 
having to prove the doctrine of baptismal regeneration, 
quotes those strong passages of ScrijDture m which all bap- 
tized adults are addressed as regenerated. He then quietly 
remarks that " a question not unnaturally arises, now that 
the people undertake to solve the difficulty for themselves 
— Do all the promises and descriptions of baptism apply to 
infant baptism ?" To tliis he rej^lies, " Certamly, unless 
they did, in effect, infant baptism were wi'ong, for so we 
should be deprivmg our children of whatever benefits it 
were sujjposed that adult baptism conferred, and mfant bap- 
tism was incapable of But since infant baptism is rights 
then must it confer m effect, and in the rudiments, all the 
benefits of adult baptism to be developed hereafter." 

If the still further progress, not alone of Bai3tist senti- 
ments, but of their practices, is desirable, it is mainly as 
affording the best, the only real security to the Church and 
the world, for the perpetuity of these great principles, of 
which the Baptists have alone been the consistent and un- 
flmching advocates. Of these, this is not to be esteemed 
the least important, that the sacraments have in themselves 
no saving power Avhatever, but depend for all their value 
and acceptability on the fiith of the recipient. These prin- 
ciples evangeUcal Christians are now generally T\dlling to 
concede ; but until infant baptism be openly abandoned, 
there is a constant tendency to reaction, a danger of re- 
lapse. The entering wedge for the recurrence of all that is 
most fatal in the delusions of Popery is in the crevice, and a 
few hard blows may at any moment spht all other Protest- 
antism to pieces. 

It is not, therefore, merely in regard to the time and ck- 
cumstances of a ceremony that Baptists are contendmg, but 



BAPTIST VIEW. 85 

it is for pnnGipUs the most valuable of any embodied in the 
Reformation from Popery, or in the whole range of evan- 
gelical piety — ^principles for which the Baptist denomination 
alone have consistently and unwaveringly contended durmg 
the last hundred years — principles at this moment poj^ular 
with the body of evangelical Christians, but for the per- 
manence of which popularity they desire more full security. 
So long as infant baptism is preached, a ISTewman, or a 
Pusey, or a Nevin, or a Schaff, can, mthout much tortur- 
ing, convert it into an acknowledgment of baptismal re- 
generation on the one side, and a Stoddard or a Bushnell 
make it the entermg wedge of a lax church-membership on 
the other. 



CHAPTER V. 

BELIEVERS THE ONLY SCRIPITJRAL SUBJECTS OF BAPTISM. 
SECTION 1. THE BAPTIST VIEW STATED. 

Not quite a hundred years ago was born one who for 
many years was a Baptist minister of great usefulness. It 
has been the lot of the writer of these pages to preach oc- 
casionally in the pulpit that was once his, and to administer 
the rites of religion to several of his descendants of three suc- 
cessive generations. Three of his children, eleven of his 
grandchildren, and either five or six of his great-grandchildren, 
have, to the knowledge of the author, joined the same de- 
nomination, by a profession of their personal faith, in Chris- 
tian baptism. Nor is he aware of more than one of all his 
descendants having reached the age of twenty who has 



86 BAPTIST VIEW. 

died ^yitliout being baptized, or who is no\y living without 
having submitted to tliat ordinance. Most of them have 
made a profession of rehgion early in life, and one most 
satisfactory case, some years ago, at the early age of ten 
years. It was when some of these young persons were 
about to be baptized that the writer was naturally led to 
consider the progress in this country of those principles of 
which their great-grandfather had been so powerM an ad- 
vocate. Then it was that the ideas of this work first pre- 
sented themselves to the author. 

And these circumstances are now mentioned both for the 
encouragement of pious parents who dedicate their chil- 
dren to God by prayer, as showing His love and faithfulness 
to children's children, and also to reheve the scruples and 
fears of such Christians as suppose that mfant baptism is 
required in order to render his gracious promises to Chris- 
tian parents more firmly sealed and sure. Baptists maintain 
as strongly as others the duty of all parents to bring up their 
children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. They 
acknowledge the propriety of Christians consecrating them- 
selves and every relation they sustain, to God, whether as 
husbands, or as wives, or as parents, and humbly dedicating 
all connected with them. Thus are their children holy, and 
thus their T\dves or husbands.^ If any special services seem 
wise and fit to impress or recognize all this in regard to any 
relation, the Baptists are ever glad to avail themselves of 
it. They have quite as usually as other Christians sought 
of God's ministers a nuptial blessing, where a merely civil 
ceremony would have answered all legal purposes. They 
are accustomed daily to implore God's blessing on their 
families, and over each meal. Sometimes Christian parents 
1 1 Cor. vii. 14. 



BAPTISTYIEW. 87 

have solemnly presented their children by public prayer of- 
fered in the house of God, that he would bestow upon them 
his heavenly grace, and pour his blessings on their seed. 
But Baptists have ever opposed transferring baptism, a di- 
vine ordinance instituted for the believer, to the person of 
an unconscious babe. This perverts a Divine institution, 
and can do them no good. All that is proposed can be bet- 
ter accomplished by prayer alone, while it robs them in- after 
years of this commanded confession of Christ, when per- 
sonal faith would give it vitality and usefulness. With as 
much propriety might Christians baptize the unbelieving 
wife on account of the fiiith of the believing husband, as 
the unthinking infant because the child of a Christian. 

Not long since, a converted Roman Catholic professor of 
theology from Italy, when at his request the subject of be- 
lievers' baptism had been explained to him, quickly asked, 
" But what then of those who die in infancy — are they all 
lost ?" It was instantly replied that his remark suggested 
the most fatal objection possible to infant baptism, namely, 
that it takes for granted, or at least strongly implies, danger 
that without it infants are not safe. 



SECTION 2. INFANT BAPTISM CONCEDED TO BE UNSCRIPTURAL. 

Many intelligent Christians, many ministers of the Gos- 
pel, who have not looked closely at the history of this con- 
troversy, are little aware how completely the researches of 
the last hundred years have proved the truth and import- 
ance of such views of believers' baptism. One after another 
we shall show how the different arguments, both from the 
Ijible and from history, hi fiivor of infant baptism, have been 
given uj), and argued against by the most enliglitened Pcdo- 



88 SPONSORS NO AUTHORITY. 

baptists themselves, iii fact that the whole system is crumb- 
ling to pieces, and is admitted to have no foundation m 
Scriptm'e. 

A hundred years ago, the substitution of sponsors was 
probably esteemed as a sufficient apology for the want of 
personal faith, with a large portion of those who preached 
infant baptism. In the Episcopal Church it is to this day 
formally stated m their catechism, as if it were considered 
the strongest argument in its favor : 

Qiies, — " What is required of persons to be baptized ?" 

Ans, — '' Repentance, whereby they forsake sin ; and faith, 
whereby they steadfastly beheve the promises of God made 
to them in that sacrament." 

Ques, — Why, then, are infants baptized, when by reason 
of their tender age they can not perform them ?" 

Ans, — " Because they promise them both, by their sure- 
ties ; Avhich promise, when they come to age, themselves are 
bound to perform." 

This ground, however, is now little thought of Except 
in the Catechism, or to children, no one would think of 
using it. Sponsors would do all very well as an authority 
for infant baptism, provided we could only get sufficient au- 
thority for the sponsors. The use of them has been given 
up by the Presbyterians, and most of the reformed churches, 
since the Reformation, as a corruption. No authority for 
them is to be found before the time of Tertullian, a.d. 200. 
Indeed all uses for Avhich such an argument could be seri- 
ously brought forward in the present day, must be based 
upon the authority of the Church to alter the institutions 
of primitive Christianity. Dr. Bunsen justly says: "The 
theories respecting Pedobaptism, according to any of the sys- 
tems of the Reformation, would be perfectly uninteUigible 



NO PHECEPT OR EXAMPLE 11^ SCRIPTUKE. 89 

to the ancient Churclies, and can not be brought into har- 
mony with their consciousness and monuments, except by 
fictions and conventionahties. But these fictions and con- 
ventionahties are also required for our own age, and it can 
not be denied that on the whole they prove inefficacious and 
insufficient^ and do not satisfy the public conscience. Those 
who deny this fact show as much an ignorance of the real 
state of the world, as of the nature of Christianity." ^ 

It used to be supposed that there were many clear and 
direct j)roofs of infant baptism, both by command and ex- 
ample, to be found in the N"ew Testament. But Dr. Woods, 
of Andover, admits candidly that "it is plain that there is 
no express precept respecting infant baptism in our sacred 
writings," and that consequently " the proof that it is -a di- 
vine institution must be made in another way." Knapp, 
also, in his " Theological Lectures," says that " there is no 
decisive example of this practice in the New Testament ;" 
and again, that " there is no express command for infant 
baptism, as Morus justly concedes," and thinks it " sufiicient 
to show that it was 7iot forbidden by Christ." ^ 

But all this only represents the state of theological opin- 
ion in a past generation. Now it is very different. When, 
for instance, the "North British Review" is arguing against 
the Puseyite writers in the Church of England, it does not 
hesitate to urge such assertions as these : " Scripture knows 
nothing of the baptism of infants." " There is absolutely 
not a single trace of it to be found in the New Testament. 
There are passages which may be reconciled with it, if the 
practice can only be proved to have existed, but there is 
not one word which asserts its existence. Nay, more ; it 

1 Hippolytus and his Age, vol. ii. pp. 108, 9. 

2 Christian Theology, p. 494. 



90 ABEAHAMIC C OTEX ANT — BAPTIST VIEAV. 

may be urged that 1 Cormthians, vii. 14 is incompatible 
with the supposition that mfant baptism was then practiced 
at Corinth." ' 

The Abrahamic Covenant, makmg baptism come in the 

room of circmncision, used to be greatly rehed upon. The 

two covenants, it was said, were substantially the same, and 

Romans iv. 11 Tvas always adduced to prove that circumcis^ 

ion was, as baptism now is, " a seal of the righteousness of 

faith." In reply. Baptists were accustomed to point out 

that, 1. Cii'cumcision was a seal or pledge of certain t€77i- 

poral blessmgs to aU who rightly received it ; but baptism 

is no seal or pledge of any thmg of the kmd. 2. Ckcum- 

cision was not a sign or seal of eternal life to all who truly 

and properly received .it ; but baptism is. 3. Ckcumcis- 

ion was to all the descendants of Abraham the sign, not of 

their oicn faith, but of the faith ''which he had," and aU 

the blessmgs of which it was the seal flowed through the 

faith of another, i. 6., Abraham ; while baptism is the sym- 

bol of our own laith, and none of the blessings of which it 

is the seal can flow to us otherwise than through this medi- 

mn. It was because the first covenant was found faulty m 

these respects that a better covenant was established upon 

better promises.^ 

By degrees the whole doctrine of the Abrahamic Cove- 
nant has'' been given up by the ablest defenders of infant 
baptism. The contradictory ^iews maintained m regard to 
it, even by the same writers, had long been pomted out be- 
fore this took place. Thus, Matthew Henry, for example, 
in one place says that " hij laptism we are Irought into the 
covenant." In another place he msists that "baptism be 
longs to those lolio are in that covenant (at least by profes 
""i Aug. 1852, pp. 209, 10. ^ Heb. vin. 6-10. 



CIRCUMCISIOK COLERIDGE'S VIEW. 91 

sion) and to none other. The infants of beheving parents 
are in covenant with God, and therefore have a right to the 
initiating seal." So as to church-membership ; in one place 
he tells us that " baptism is an ordinance of Christ, whereby 
the person baptized is solemnly ad'initted a member of the 
visible church ;" yet, in the same Treatise, he assures us 
that baptism "is an ordinance of the visible Church, and 
pertams therefore to those that are visible members ; their 
covenant right and their church-membership entitleth them 
to baptism. Baptism doth not give the title, but recognizes 
it, and completes that church-membership which before was 
imperfect." ^ It is this obvious contradiction which, running 
through all the writings of the Congregationahst and Pres- 
byterian defenders of this system, has silently caused it to 
lose its power on the more thoughtful advocates of this 
rite, from Coleridge to Dr. Hodge. Certain it is that the 
whole of the ground is given up, and admitted to be of no 
divine authority in favor of the system. 

Perhaps no man's thoughts have more weight at this 
time than those of Coleridge.^ After showing the error of 
inferring the title of infants to this rite from the cases of 
household baptism, he adds : 

" Equally vain is the pretended analogy from circumcis- 
ion, which was no sacrament at all, but the means and mark 
of national distinction. Circumcision was intended to dis- 
tinguish the Jews by some indelible sign, and it was no less 
necessary that Jewish children should be recognizable as 
Jews than Jewish adults, not to mention the greater safety 
of the rite in infancy. Nor Avas it ever pretended tliat any 

^ Booth, Pedo. Examined, p. 173. 

2 Aids to Reflection : Article on Baptism. 



92 CIECUMCISION — HODGE'S VIEW. 

grace was conferred with it, or that the rite teas significant 
of any inward or spiritual operation?"^ 

Li Ms Notes on Jeremy Taylor,^ he repeats these re- 
marks in substance, adding : " This is clear, for the woman 
had no corresponding rite, but the same result was obtained 
by the various severe laws concernmg their marriage with^ 
ahens, and other actions." This, it might, however, be said, 
was the language of a mere philosopher, not a fair repre^ 
sentation of any ecclesiastical body of Christians. But 
when the Old School Presbyterians began to be attacked by 
the EpiscopaUans, who j^lead the analogy of circumcision 
and of the ancient JeT\dsh church in favor of admitting' 
good and bad into Christian churches, the " Princeton Re- 
view" ^ abandons the covenant of circumcision, and assumes 
so far Baptist ground. Dr. Hodge says : ''It is to be remem- 
bered that there were two covenants made with Abraham. 
By the one, his natural descendants through Isaac were con- 
stituted a commonwealth, an external, visible community. 
By the other, his spiritual descendants were constituted a 
church. * * * There can not be a greater mistake than to 
confound the national covenant with the covenant of grace, 
and the commonwealth founded on the one with the Church 
founded on the other. 

" When Christ came, the commonwealth was abolished, 
and there was nothmg put m its place. The Chm-ch re- 
mained, * * * a spiritual society mth spiritual promises, 
on the condition of faith in Christ. In no part of the New 
Testament is any other condition of membership m the 
Church i^resented than that contained in the answer of 
Philip to the eunuch, who desired baptism : ' If thou be- 
lievest A^dth all thy heart, thou mayest. And he answered 

^ "Works, vol. V. p. 186. Harper. 2 Oct. 1853, pp. 684, 685. 



HOUSEHOLD BAPTISMS. 93 

and said, I believe that Jesus is the Son of God.' The 
Church, therefore, is in its essential nature a company of 
believers, and not an external society requiring merely ex- 
ternal profession as condition of membership." This lan- 
guage may fail to draw any distinction between the visible 
Churches and the invisible Church, yet the very confusion 
makes the completeness of his abandonment of circumcision 
as any authority for infant baptism, the more obvious. 

Great stress used to be laid upon the cases of household 
baptism mentioned in Scripture, ^. e. those of Stephanas,^ 
the jailor,^ and that of Lydia." From these our Pedobap- 
tist brethren have been in the habit of inferring the baptism 
of children as a part of some of these households. On the 
contrary. Baptists have contended that in the former two 
of these cases, we have proof that infants were not included 
in that term,'' and that as to the case of Lydia, _there is 
every jDrobability there were none, from the circumstance 
of her being apparently a single woman in a strange city ; 
while numerous other cases of devout or believmg house- 
holds ^ clearly show that infants were not embraced by such 
a term in instances like these. 

In Kitto's Biblical Cyclopaedia is an article on Baptism, 
j prepared by Professor J. Jacobi, at the request of ]N'eander, 
and endorsed by hun as "in unison with his o^vn princi- 
ples." Alluding to household baptism, as the " strongest ar- 
gument" from Scripture for infant baptism, the writer says, 
however, that " in none of these instances has it been 

* 1 Cor. i. 16. ^ Acts, xvi. 33. 3 Acts, xvi. 15. 

* See 1 Cor. xvi. 15 ; Acts, xvi. 32 and 34. 

5 Such as those of Crispus, Acts, xviii. 8 ; the nobleman of Capernaum, 
^Tohn, iv. 53 ; Onesiphorus, 2 Tim. iv. 19 ; and that of Cornehus, Acts, 
£.2. 



94 HOUSEHOLD BAPTIS:MS COLERIDGE. 

proved that there were little children among them ; but 
even supposing that there were, there was no necessity for 
excluding them from baptism in plain words, since such an 
exclusion icas understood as a matter of course,'^'' 

Xeander himself thus states his couAdetions on this point 
"We can not mfer the existence of infant baptism from the 
instances of the baptism of whole families ; for the passage,, 
1 Corinthians, xvi. 15, shows the flillacv of such a conclu- 
sion, as from that it appears that the whole family of Ste- 
phanus, who were baptized by Paul, consisted of adults." 

Coleridge, however, in his comment on baptism,^ has 
placed this matter m the strongest light : 

" I must concede to you that too many of the Pedobap- 
tists have erred. I have, I confess, no eye for these smoke- 
like wreaths of inference, tliis ever-widening spiral ergo 
fi-om the narrow aperture of a single text, or rather an in- 
terpretation forced into it by construing an idiomatic phrase, 
in an artless narrative, with the same absoluteness as if it 
had formed part of a mathematical problem. I start back 
from these inverted pyramids, where the apex is the base. 
If I should inform any one that I had called at a friend's 
house, but had found nobody at home, the family having 
all gone to the play ; and if he, on the strength of this m- 
formation, should take occasion to asperse my friend's wife 
for immotherly conduct in taking an infant six months' old 
to a crowded theatre, would you allow him to press the 
words ' nobody' and ' all the fmiily' in justification of the 
slander? Would you not tell him that the words were to be 
interpreted by the nature of the subject, the purpose of the 
speaker, and their ordmary acceptation ; and that he must or 

* " Planting and Training of the Christian Church," book iiL chap. v. 
p. 101. 2 Aids to Reflection, p. 319. 



CHEIST BLESSING CHILDRE]^. 95 

might have kno^yn that infants of that age would not be 
admitted into the theatre ? Exactly so with regard to the 
words, ' he and all his household: Had baptism of infants 
at that early period of the Gospel been a kno^TO practice, 
or had this been previously demonstrated, then indeed the 
argument that in all probability there were infants or 
young children hi so large a family, would be no otherwise 
objectionable than as being superfluous, and a sort of anti- 
clunax in logic. But if the words are cited as the proof, 
it would be a cIq^y petitio principii, though there had been 
nothing else against it. But when we turn back to the 
Scriptures precedmg the narrative, and find repentance and 
behef demanded as the terms and indispensable conditions 
of baptism, then the case above imagined apphes in its full 
force." 

The circumstances of Christ blessing the little children' 

used to be brought forward as strongly favoring infant 

baptism. On the other hand. Baptists always contended that 

as we have three accounts of this transaction,^ detailing all 

that did transpire, this occurrence leaves no room for the 

supposition that Jesus considered infants fit subjects for 

baptism. It was justly remarked by Jeremy Taylor, on 

this side two hundred years ago, that " From the action of 

^Christ's blessing mfants, to infer that they were baptized, 

iproves nothing so much as that there is a want of better 

cargument ; for the conclusion would with more probability 

cbe derived thus : Christ blessed children and so dismissed 

;them, but baptized them not, therefore infants are not to 

;be baptized." 

; Olshausen, commenting on this passage, says : " Of tliat 

reference to infant baptism, which it is so common to seek 

1 Matt. xix. 13-15. ^ S§e Mark, x. 13-16, and Luko, xviii. 15-17. 



i 



96 1 COEINTHIAKS, YII. 14. 

in tMs narrative, tliere is clearly not the slightest trace to 
be found." 

Even Doddridge, thongli advocating it in his remarks on 
this very passage, says : " I acknowledge these words will 
not of themselves prove infant baptism to be an institution 
of Chiist." 

Professor Jacobi speaks of the argument from this text 
as obsolete, and generally given up. " In support of it [ia- 
fant baptism] the advocates in former ages noio hardly any 
used to appeal to Matthew xix. 14." He appears to think it 
unworthy of further mention.^ || 

1 Corinthians, vii. 14, was formerly considered one of the 
strongest proof-texts. Pedobaptists argued that here the 
children of believers were plainly spoken of as " made holy" 
by their connection with Christian parents, which, they in- 
ferred, could only be through baptism, and must be intended 
as an allusion to that ordmance. Baptists have generally 
urged that, by the same principle carried out, this passage 
would teach the baptism of every unconverted husband of 
a believing wife ; and that, on the contrary, it plainly proves 
that the children of Christian parents were no more bap- 
tized, and had no closer connection with the Church than 
the unbelieving partners of Christians.^ 

In accordance with this latter \iew, Neander finds here a 
proof that at that time infant baptism was unknown to the 
Corinthian Church.^ Or, as Professor Jacobi says in the 
article on baptism before quoted : 

" A pretty sure indication of its non-existence in the 
apostolic age may be inferred from 1 Corinthians, vii. 14, 

^ Kitto's Bib. Ency. Art. Baptism. 

2 See Tracts on Important Subjects, No. 8, by Dr. Dagg. 

3 See Planting and Training, book iii. chap. 5. 



CHILDEEN HOLY. 97 

since Paul would certainly have referred to the baptism of 
children for their holiness." 

"The North British Review," ' arguing against the Popish 
doctrine of baptismal regeneration, says expressly : 

" 1 Corinthians, vii. 14, is incompatible with the supposi- 
tion that infant baptism was then practiced at Corinth. 
The Apostle in this passage seeks to remove the scruples of 
those Christian partners in mixed marriages who believed 
that a conjugal union with *a heathen was a state profane 
and unholy in God's sight. He reassures them by an argu- 
ment founded on a reductio ad ahsicrdmn. You admit, 
says he, that your children are holy, then Be persuaded that 
the marriage from which that sanctity was derived is holy 
also. For were it otherwise, if, as you imagine, the mar- 
riage is unholy, then it would follow that the children that 
are the fruits of it would be unclean and unholy also, whereas 
you know and admit the reverse. You confess them to be 
^'holy. It is absolutely indispensable for the vahdity of this 
argument that the sanctity of the children should have been 
exclusively derived from the sanctity of the marriage, for on 
no other hypothesis could the sanctity of the children have 
furnished a proof of the sanctity of the marriage. Had the 
children been baptized they would have been holy, in their 
^own right, as members of Christ, and a father who had had 
'his children baptized would have effectually demolished the 
^Apostle's reasoning by the simple rejDly that the holiness 
of his children, as members of Christ's Church, was no reason 
for his thinking the marriage holy, or his not putting away 
^lis unbelieving wife. Many, indeed, have explained the 
term holy as meaning "- have been admitted to baptism," 
mking the verse say that if the faith of the beheving part- 
* August, 1852. Art. 3. i 

5 



^ 



98 PROSELYTE BAPTISM. 

ner had not sanctified the marriage, the children would not 
have been admitted to baptism, whereas they had been 
baj^tized. £ut this is to re-write Scripture^ not to interpret 
it:' 

Thus, then, there is not a single clear scriptural argument 
in favor of infant baptism, not one but has been given up 
by several Pedobaptists, the most enlightened who have 
examined this subject ^dthin the last few years. Proselyte 
haptism used, however, to be* strongly urged. The Jews, 
it was said, had a custom of baptizing all their j^roselytes, and 
if the head of a family was initiated, all the children were 
subjected to the same rite. Hence it was inferred that un- 
less some distinct proof to the contrary could be shown, it 
must be taken for granted that the same rule was apphed 
to the Christian as to the Je^^ish ceremony. 

To this Baptists usuaUy rephed that even supposing this 
custom could be proved to extend back to apostolic tunes, 
the inference would not follow, o^ing to the utter difference 
of the two dispensations. The baptism of John, as one 
emphatically of repentance, could only have embraced adults. 
" Proselyte baptism," Augusti says, " mcluded the children 
with the parents ; John's baptism excluded both children 
and the female sex, formmg the germ from which Christian 
baptism developed itself." This would effectually cut off 
any such inferential connection. But it is now admitted 
that there is no proof of the Jewish rite in question until 
two hundred years after the tune of our Saviour. Much 
learning has been expended on this subject. Professor 
Jacobi says that the opinion that proselyte baptism was be- 
fore Christian baptism " is not at all tenable," but that it 
was probably only a purif}dng ceremony. It was raised to 
the character of an initiatory and indispensable rite co^ 



SILENCE OF CHUECH HISTORY. 99 

ordinate with that of sacrifice and circumcision, only after 
the destruction of the Temple. Then sacrifices had ceased, 
and the circumcision of proselytes had, by reason of public 
edicts, become more and more impracticable." ^ 

Such is the view, also, of Professor Stuart, who urges a 
still more decisive objection to this as any foundation for 
ordmary infant baptism, ^. 6., that it certainly did not fol- 
low the rule of circumcision, never being administered to 
those children born after their parents became Jews. He, 
therefore, properly regards it as a surprismg thing that this 
should be adduced in proof of infant baptism.^ 



§ III. Church History. 

(a.) The cause of its silence as to Infant Baptism, 

The great reliance of our Pedobaptist brethren has been 
upon Church History. It has been urged that, by its means 
at least, infant baptism could be clearly proved of apostolic 
origin, and that thus the very silence of the New Testament 
m.ust have arisen from its being a matter of course. To 
this Baptists replied, that to call in the aid of tradition and 
history, was to give up the sufEciency and completeness of 
Scripture, and cut up by the root the great Protestant 
principle which makes the Bible our rule of faith. This, 
and more than this. Chevalier Bunsen fully admits : ^ " The 
Reformation appealed to Scripture alone, and accepted only 
with a general reserve the creeds of the councils, * * * 
yet the Reformation accepted Pedobaptism, although its 

' Kitto, Art. Baptism. « 

2 Art. on tho Mode of Baptism, Biblical Repository, April, 1833, sec. 3, 

3 Hippolytus and his Age, vol. ii. pp. 104, 5. 



100 DR. wall's great fault. 

leaders were more or less aioare that it teas neither scriptural 
nor apostolic.'''' 

Baptists, however, have had no objection impartially to 
examine the testimony of Chm'ch History, provided that, 
like that of all other witnesses, we were at liberty to cross- 
question it, where contradictory, and were not bound to re- 
ceive every thing asserted, however improbable, as the final 
decisions of a judge in a court of law, or the Holy Scrip- 
tures. They contended that, if fairly examined, the earUest 
records of Ecclesiastical History were quite adverse to the 
idea of infant baj^tism being apostolic in its origin. Rather 
more than a hundred years ago Drs. Wall and Gale dis- 
cussed the question in this sjDirit, mth a degree of learning 
and ability that promised to exhaust the subject. But the 
death of Gale suddenly arrested it on his side ; nor has it 
been continued since Dr. Wall left it, in England or Amer- 
ica, except in a fragmentary manner Among the Germans, 
however, the fresh spirit of historical criticism awakened by 
Niebuhr, and his more judicious followers, has begun to throw 
the impartial light of history upon this vexed question. 

The chief fault of Doctor Wall is one that he shared in 
degree with Bingham, i, 6., of supposing that because clear 
and undeniable traces of an institution might be found in 
the third and fourth centuries, therefore, it must be supposed 
to have existed in the first, except so far as its intermediate 
sources of development could be clearly and positively 
traced. This made all the silence of Church history favor- 
able to the existence of any custom, howevw corrupt, which 
arose by such slow degrees as not to awaken immediate 
general opposition. In this case it threw on the Baptists 
the difficult task of proving a negative ; and because they 
could not bring forward passages objecting against infant 



RISE OF INFANT BAPTISM. 101 

baptism before it existed, it was supposed to be shoi^Ti that 
these authors must all have acquiesced in, and approved of it. 

But within the last fifty years a spirit of more careful 
historical criticism has prevailed ; and it is now well ascer- 
tained that where a custom like infant baptism is supposed 
extensively to have existed, we shall be sure to find inci- 
dents or allusions to it in certain places in Church history, 
as soon as it really became current. If in the fifth century 
we have clear and frequent traces of a custom wide-spread 
and becoming universal, but fewer and fainter allusions to 
it in similar circumstances in the third, and none in the 
second or in Scripture, we have a right to infer that silence 
as strong evidence against the origmal prevalence, if not 
the existence, of the usage in question. It is thus that the 
origin of Ecclesiastical Councils may be traced. The ab- 
sence of any protest against their authority in the first two 
centuries is the best proof, not of their universal recogni- 
tion, in the ordinary government of the churches, but of 
the opposite. Their rlsiiig importance from the beginning 
of the fourth century, best shows that they were not at 
first a part of regular Church government. The same kind 
of silence in regard to infant baptism most efiectually dis- 
proves its apostolic origin. 

Doctor Bunsen, therefore, says,^ " Pedobaptism, in the 
more modern sense, meaning thereby baptism of new-born 
infants, with the vicarious promises of parents or other 
sponsors, was ittterly unknown to the early Churchy not only 
down to the end of the second^ hut indeed to the middle of 
the third century.'^'' The same writer considers that it must 
have been unknown to Irena3us and his disciple, Ilippoly- 
tus, A.D. 220, but that " Cyprian was the first father A\dio, 
* Hyppoljtus, vol. iii. p. 180. 



102 RISE OF PEDOBAPTISM COLERIDGE. 

impelled by a fanatical enthusiasm and assisted by a bad 
interpretation of the Old Testament, estabhshed it as a 
principle." Coleridge, indeed, writing about the year 1816, 
says, " I confine myself to the assertion — not that infant 
baptism was not — but that there is no sufficient proof that 
it was the practice of the Apostohc age." ^ The great in- 
consistency of this ground, is, that infant baptism is just that 
kind of institution which if it had existed must have given 
proofs of itself It was not an msignificant or occasional, 
but a daily matter among the first Christians, if it occurred 
at all. It was either universal or imknoioji. Either a di- 
vine command ^^erfectly understood and obeyed ; or not a 
command at all. So much, at least, the silence of Scri]3ture 
must be allowed to prove. If it existed at all it was always 
practiced ; and then when the parents became Christians 
aU then* young children were baptized with them, or as 
soon as they were born. To suppose that aH this could 
have existed without leavmg proofs, one way or the other, 
is only a transition state of opmion. In the private notes 
of the same writer on the works of Robmson, there is this 
passage, " When the Baptist says : I thmk myself obliged 
to obey Christ scrupulously, and believiag that he did not 
command hifant baptism, but on the contrary, baptism un- 
der conditions incompatible with infancy (faith and repent- 
ance), therefore, I can not with innocence, because I can 
not m faith, baptize an mfant at all, or an adult othermse 
than by immersion, I honor the man and incline to his doc- 
trine as the more Scriptural?'^ ^ 

The progressive weight of this kind of evidence on the 
mhid of l^eander is very traceable in the difference between 

^ Aids to Reflection, Aphorism on Baptism, note. 
2 "Works, vol. V. p. 542. Harper. 



neakder's later views. 103 

the former and latter editions of the first volume of his 
Church History. At first (in 1825), he wrote thus : 

" It is certain that Christ did not ordain infant baptism. 
We can not prove that the Apostles ordained it. From 
the deficiency of historical documents during the first half 
of this period we must also avow that the want of any pos- 
itive testimony to the custom can not be brought as an 
argument against its antiquity." ^ 

But in 1842, seventeen years later, the defects in the first 
edition appeared to Neander so glaring that he re-wrote 
nearly the whole. At the same place m the second edition 
he says : 

"Baptism was administered at first only to adults, as 
men were accustomed to conceive baptism and faith as 
strictly connected. We have all reason for not deriving 
infant baptism from Apostolic institution.^^ ^ 

In the second volume, alluding to the period from a.d. 312 
to 590, after saying that in theory infant baptism was now gen- 
erally esteemed an apostolical institution he carefully adds : 
" But from the theory on this point we can draw no infer- 
ence with regard to the practice. It was still very far from 
being the case, especially in the Greek Church that infant 
baptism although acknowledged to be necessary, was gener- 
ally mtroduced into practice : among Christians of the East, 
infant baptism, though in theory acknowledged to be neces- 
sary [to salvation], yet entered so rarely and icith so mitcli 
difficulty into the Church life during the first half of this 
period." ' 

Intermediate, chronologically between the first and sec- 
ond editions of Ins History, stands the publication of " The 

^ See Roso's Translatlou, vol. L p. 1G6. 

2 Vol. i. p. 311. Torroy. ^ Vol. ii. p. 319. Torroy. 



104 BUNSEX ON INFANT BAPTISM. 

Planting and Training of tlie Christian Church." And it is 
intermediate in the measure of its certainty as to the origin 
of infant baptism. " As baptism was closely united with a 
conscious entrance on Christian communion ; faith and bap- 
tism were always connected A^ith one another, and thus it is 
in the highest degree prohahle that baptism was performed 
only in instances where both could meet together, and that 
the practice of mfant baptism was miknown at this pe- 
riod." ' 

Dr. Bunsen in " Hippolytus and his Times" thus sums up 
his OT\Ti historical views of this question in one place : ^ 
''The difference, then, between the ante-lS'icene and the 
later Church was essentially this : the later Church, with 
the excejDtion of converts, only baptized new-born infants, 
and she did so on principle. The ancient \i, 6., ante-Nicene] 
Church, as a general rule, baptized adults, and only after 
they had gone through a course of instruction ; and, as the 
exception, only Christian children who had not arrived at 
years of maturity, hut never infants, Tertullian's opposi- 
tion is to the baptism of young growing children. He does 
not say one word about new-born infants. N^either does 
Origen, when his expressions are accurately vreighed. Cy- 
prian and some other African bishops, his cotemporaries, at 
the close of the thh'd century, were the first who viewed 
baptism in the light of a washing away of the universal sin- 
ftihiess of human nature, and connected this idea with that 
ordinance of the Old Testament^ — circumcision." 

He goes on to give the reasons why '' the Church has been 

dragged into this icrong path /" and concludes by sajdng, 

" This is the consequence of the admission of an untruth. 

When the Church attached rights and promises of blessing 

^ Book iii. chap. 5. 2 Yol. iii. p. 194. 



EISE OF IIs'FAlSrT BAPTISM BUiNSEK. 105 

to any thing except to the conscious abandonment of sin, 
and to the voluntary void of dedicating life and soul to the 
Lord, the consciousness of sin and the longing for real 
truthful reformation died away in the same proportion 
among her members." 

Comparing ancient baptism with modern, he says,^ " But 
if you look closely into the ecclesiastical condition of the 
two ages, are you not overpowered by one predominant 
feeling ? And is not this the feeling that in the one age we 
find upon the Y/hole, connection, reality, mternal and exter- 
nal truth ; in the other little else but patchwork and ruins, 
shams and phantoms ? That in one case a real life was 
lived, a hfe of freedom as to the Church and as to the in- 
dividual ; that in the other conventionalism is fostered, or 
rather in most instances maintained by fire and sword, by 
the tyranny of State Churches, or by the imthinking super- 
stition of habit ? and that such a state of things is most ill- 
advisedly vaunted as possessing vitality, while it most im- 
pudently proclaims itself perfect and infalhble. 

"The ancient baptism comprised on Gospel groimds /b^^/' 
spiritual elements — ^instruction, examination, the vow, the 
initiation. * * * Thus did the beggar enter into the 
communion of the faithful, thus the emperor when he ven- 
tured to do so. Constantine considered of it until his death- 
bed." " It is impossible but that this ceremony should have 
produced a great general impression, which was not dimin- 
ished if the initiated were the child of Christian parents. 
The act was his own as much as it was in the case of a con- 
vert from heathenism. The very gradual advancement, 
even of the age of baptism m the case of children of 
Christian famiUes, must have been injurious to its charac- 
^ Yol. iii. p. 201. 



106 EISE OF i:NrFANT BAPTISM BUNSEN. 

ter as a solemnity. We have already seen how, even 
before the close of our period, [a.d. 325] the baptism of 
new-born infants grew out of that of children advancing 
toward the age of boyhood. We have seen how, from the 
baptism of the spirit, which Christ instituted, people re- 
lapsed into ceremonial law, and fell back upon the shadow of 
a Jewish custom (circumcision) which had ceased to be bind- 
ing with the extinction of the nation, and now was made a 
sanction for the religion of the new covenant of humanity. 

" In consequence of this alteration and complete subver- 
sion of its main features, brought about principally by the 
Africans of the third century and completed by Augustine, 
these natural elements have been, in the course of nearly 
fifteen centuries, most tragically decomposed^ and nothing 
is 71010 remaining any inhere hut ruins. In the East people 
adhered to immersion, although this symbol of man volun- 
tarily and consciously making a vow of the sacrifice of self, 
lost all meaning in the immersion of a new-horn child. 
The Eastern Church, moreover, practiced the unction im- 
mediately after the immersion, although that unction im- 
plies even more than immersion, man's full consciousness ; 
and is to be the seal of a free pledge of a responsible act. 
Yet the Eastern Church requires, nevertheless, the general 
recognition of both as necessary to salvation, and denies 
there is any efiicacy in the Western form of baptism. 

" The Western Church evidently commenced her career 
under the guidance of Rome, with more freedom of thought. 
She abolished, together with adult baptism its symbol, im- 
mersion, and introduced sprinkling in its stead. She re- 
tained again unction (the chrisma) by way of confirmation, 
and sejDarated the two acts." ^ 

'- Page 204. 



I 



NOKTH BRITISH REVIEW. 107 

Such overwhelming concessions and proofs of the truth 
of Baptist views, as to the unscripturalness of infant baptism, 
as abound m the subsequent pages of these volumes make 
it only astonishing that even with all the restrictions he 
would throw around it, Bunsen should advocate retainmg 
it at all. He admits that it will appear strange, and even 
allows, that, in order to effect it, " in the first j^lace the doc- 
trine of Biblical baptism must be reforinedP ^ Thus, to 
accommodate the religious prejudices of the age. Biblical 
Christianity is to be modified, ay and " reformed'''' at pleas- 
ure ! Thus Pedobaptism contains the germs of Popery, on 
the one hand, and of German skepticism on the other. 

The " ISTorth British Peview" not only concedes freely 
and repeatedly that " the only baptism known to the N^ew 
Testament, was that of adults," on their ]3rofession of faith, 
but argues strongly from that, accounting for the early 
views of tlie connection of baptism with a state of salva- 
tion. Peviewing " Hippolytus and his Times" it remarks" 
in a note that " the correctness of the picture of ancient 
baptism, given by Dr. Bunsen, will not, we apprehend, be 
disputed by any one who is content to accept the mere facts 
of the case^^'' and that it is "a subject on which they could 
have wished especially to dwell." They point the attention 
of the reader to what Dr. Bunsen has so clearly shown to 
be the animating principle of baptism, namely, '' the thank- 
ful offering of the self-will to God," and significantly attempt 
to plead that '^ the question of the validity of infant bap- 
tism is one separated from that of its direct apostolic aii- 
thorityP Since, then, the animating principle and correct 
form are both confessedly wanting, but for the customs of 
early education it would be easier far to turn Quaker and 
1 Page 211. 2 May, 1863. 



108 ANCIE>^T CATECHUMENS. 

deny the obligation of any baptism, than admit the ]3erpe- 
tuity of the command, and yet plead that it is fulfilled in 
such an emasculated rite as this. 

Let any Christian read in jNTeander's life of Christ ^ the 
chapter on "The Church" and its object, let him mark its 
fundamental idea as there laid down, i. 6., a community 
founded on the principle of all its members being absolutely 
sitbordinated in heart to God and Christ ;'^ and then con- 
sider the inevitable effect of admitting every infant of pious 
parents to its initiating rite. Let him bear m mind that 
the very idea, and even the name of the Church, are to be 
traced back to Christ himself, no less than a voluntary bap- 
tism as its initiatory rite, and then behold infant baptism 
sweeping, as it does, the world into the Church, and say if 
it at all realizes that conception. In fact the true question 
lying at the bottom of all this is, whether the Church is a 
divine institution. If so infant baptism radically alters it, 
and is tlierefore invalid. 

(h.) The Catechmnenical system decisive. 

But it has not been merely the silence of early Church 
history that has disproved infant baptism. It has been 
clearly shown that there were other institutions among the 
early Christians utterly opposed to the bestowment of this 
rite on infants. 

The catechumens of the Ancient Church were a body of 
persons composed entirely of such as were preparmg for 
baptism by instruction and special prayer. They were at 
first something like the inquirers connected with many of 
our modern evangelical churches, and there is no doubt 
that the Methodist custom of anxious seats and classes of 
1 Book iv. part ii. chap. 4. 2 Page 124, Harper. 



CATECHUMEKS ALL UNBAPTIZED. 109 

penitents was derived by Mr. Wesley, chiefly from reading 
the accounts of this order in the ancient congregations. 
Indeed the difference between them. Hes chiefly in two 
pomts : 1st. That as more attention was bestowed in the 
ancient classes, on the facts of Christianity, than is now 
done in our Bible classes, so by degrees less examination 
was made as to experimental piety. 2d. All the ancient 
catechumens were persons preparing for baptism (an ordi- 
nance originally regarded as the jorofession of regeneration, by 
degrees as its consummation, and in later times too often con- 
founded with regeneration itself), while Mr. Wesley's anxious 
classes were supposed to be baptized persons, yet seeking 
regeneration by the spirit of God. The ancient catechu- 
mens, then, were unregenerate inquirers out of the Church ; 
the modern catechumens were unregenerate inquirers loith- 
in. The lines of demarcation were most rigidly drawn 
between the catechumens and the baptized, so that in Au- 
gustine's time, or as late as the year a.d. 400, the question 
" Is he fidelis or catechiunenus .^" meant the same thing as 
the inquiry, " Is he yet baptized or not ?" as Wall shows. 
The catechumens sat in a specific part of the church, had 
special prayers offered for them, that they might become lit 
for the holy initiation, and were not allowed to remain even 
in the house of worship while the eucharist was celebrated. 
If one did so accidentally, he was to be immediately taken 
and baptized ; or if one was supposed to be in danger of 
death, he was to be baptized, and if he recovered, the 
course of his religious instruction completed afterward, but 
still he was not called, or considered, or ranked as a cate- 
chumen.^ 

1 Council of Laodicoa, Can. d-T, a.d. 861. The proof of all this is un- 
questionable. Any one can, however, easily verify it for himself by con- 



110 childre:n' catechumejS'S. 

From tlie time of Tertullian, this order in Christian con- 
gregations may be considered to have been universal, and 
traces of it are found by Augusti as far back as a.d. 110. 
Regularly no person could be admitted to baptism, without 
being a catechumen. If there was danger of death, excep- 
tion was made, but not otherwise. The ordinary period for 
remaining in this state of instruction, was three years, but 
wdiere a pei'son was earnest in his attendance and disposition, 
and well instructed in the history of Christ, and the doctrines 
of Christianity, he was admitted much soone]*, often in a few 
months or weeks. But all had to be made catechumens 
first. Baptists have always contended that the children of 
pious parents were no exceptions to this rule ; that by degrees 
they were often made nominal catechumens at a very early 
age, and frequently remained all their lives members of this 
class, being only baptized, like Constantine, just before death. 
Thus, Basil (a.d. 350), exhorting the catechumens to bap- 
tism, alludes to this, it is claimed when he says : "Do you 
demur and loiter and put it off, when you have been fro'in 
a child catechised in the Word; are you not yet acquainted 
with the truth ? Having heen alioays learning it, are you 
not yet come to the knowledge of it ? A seeker all your 
life long, a considerer till you are old. When w^ill you be- 
come one of us." '^ Dr. Wall and others have denied that 
these youths could be children of Christians ; but from that 
day to this, the priests of the Romish and of the Greek 
Churches have always gone through the form of first mak- 
ing every child of Christian parents a catechumen before 
they baptize it. 

suiting "Bingham's Christian Antiquities," book i. chap. 3, and book x. 
generally. " Coleman's Christian Antiquities," chap. ii. sec. 5. 
^ Basil Oratio Exhort, ad Baptiamumu 



BASIL. Ill 

It would seem that the larger part of the catechumens ad- 
dressed by Basil, had been made such hi childhood. Hence 
they must have been the children of pious parents. Dr. 
Wall admits that when he first saw the above extract, he 
thought it " the strongest evidence against the general 
practice of infant baptism in those times." Baptists think 
so still. His supposition that so large a proportion of this 
body were the children of catechumens, seems to them out of 
all reason. Besides, they say when afterward infant baptism 
did prevail, as in the time of Justinian, a.d. 526, it was an 
established rule that on any adult becoming a catechumen, 
Ills children icere all haptized forthwith ; even while he re- 
mained in the preparatory state for two years. 

In proportion as infant baptism became general, it reduced 
the catechumenical state to a merely nominal thing, but the 
forr)% of it was still strictly adhered to, and has been ever 
since. In some Irish Church regulations, probably about 
the year a.d. 600, it is provided that the infants of Chris- 
tians may be made catechumens on the eighth day, and 
that after that they can be baptized at any festival.^ At 

1 The following is the present rule of the Romish Church: " The per- 
son to be baptized is brought or conducted to the church door, but for- 
bidden to enter as one unworthy. * * * The priest then asks what 
he demands of the Church of Cod, and having received an answer, lie 
first instructs Mm catechetically in the doctrine of the Christian faith, of 
which a profession is made in baptism. But as the catechetical form 
consists of question and answer, if the person to be instructed be an 
adult, he himself answers the interrogatories; if an infant, the sponsor 
answers according to the prescribed form, and enters into a solemn en- 
gagement for the child." Then follow the exorcism, salt, sign of tlio 
cross, spittle, renunciation, the oil of the catechumens, the profession of 
faith, and then the baptism. An adult is kept a catechumen for some 
monthSj but an infant is made a catechumen and baptized at once. (Cate- 



112 INSTRUCTION BEFORE BAPTISM. 

an earlier period they were ke]3t in this state till three 
or four years old, so that they might be taught to repeat at 
baptism some of the sacred words, as Gregory Nazianzen 
recommends. 

It follows that the early churches all held it as a primi- 
tive truth that those born of Christian parents equally 
with others needed instruction and the renunciation of sin 
before baptism could properly and regularly be adminis- 
tered. This is precisely the Baptist theory and practice — 
the pomt on which they differ from all Pedobaptist 
Churches. Even Dr. Henry of I^ew York, in his abridg- 
ment of Bmgham's Ecclesiastical Antiquities, admits that 
" it is difficult to reconcile the ^^ractice of mfant commun- 
ion with the well-kno^Ti custom of training the young for 
some time as catechumens before they were admitted either 
to baptism or the eucharist." ^ The whole practice of the 
Church from Auo-ustine to Luther in makinoi: infants cate- 
chumens before baptism, is so far as it goes, the admission 
of a witness under cross-examination against his own pre- 
possessions and prejudices, to the truth of Baptist idews. 

chism of the Council of Trent.) In the hturgy of the G-reek Church, and 
indeed in all the liturgies, the " seahng" of infants as catechumens before 
their baptism is required. In Augustine's time, a.d. 400, whenever an 
infaLit was baptized, the sponsor replied to the questions in the name of 
the child, which an adult would have been taught to answer as a cate- 
chumen, just as now in the Greek and Roman churches. Boniface, in his 
correspondence with Auzustine, is very much troubled at this, and rep- 
resents others as objecting strenuously to it, and begs for some more solid 
reason in its favor, than the authority of the Church. " How can this," 
says Boniface " be reconciled to truth, which the sponsor answers in the 
child's name?" Augustine replies "You are wont to be exceedingly 
cautious of any thing that looks Uke a lie." 
' Sec. 194. 



CATECHUMENICAL SYSTEM. 113 

In the fourth and fifth centuries the Churches were in 
a transition state. Two practices essentially contrary to 
each other prevailed — that of giving catechumenical instruc- 
tion to children, and infant baptism. Both could not have 
belonged to primitive Christianity, for the two are in their 
very essence contradictory. Prior catechumenical instruc- 
tion to the children of Christians never would have been 
thought of had infant baptism been a universal, or even a 
general custom when it arose. As when a scion, tall and 
vigorous, grows up from the side of an old trunk prostrate 
and rotten, we know that the ancient tree must have lived, 
decayed, and fallen before the young one began to grow, 
and overspread it mth roots ; so when we see infant bap- 
tism after the fourth century, waxing strong, becoming 
universal, trampling on catechumenical instruction and re- 
ducing it to a mere form, it is clear that this lifeless, pros- 
trate, and decaying order must have existed, and become 
old, hefore infant baptism, as a system, took root in its 
sides, or to use Neander's expression, "entered mto the 
Church life." Nor could the younger custom have 
swelled to the size it afterward assumed, and presumed to 
stretch its roots as they now lie across that more ancient 
system, until the catechumenical rank had been first up- 
heaved and overthrown. Such, accordmg to the Baptists, is 
the true view of the catechumenical system, such the proof 
it affords of the unscriptural origin of infant baptism. 

Let us observe how far recent researches have sustained 
this view. A Mr. Coleman has done a good service to 
the churches in this country in condensing and translat- 
ing from the works of Augusti on Christian Antiquities. 
The following extract contains in substance tlie results of 
that distinguished authority upon this subject. 



114 CHAIN^GE MADE BY INFANT BAPTISM. 

" The general introduction of the rite of infant baptism 
has so far changed the regulations of the Church concerning 
the qualifications of candidates, and their admission, that 
what was formerly the rule in this respect has become the 
exception. The institutions of the Church during the first 
five centuries concerning the requisite preparations for bap- 
tism, and all the laws and rules that existed during that 
period, relating to the acceptance or rejection of candi- 
dates, necessarily fell into disuse, when the baptism of in- 
fants began not only to be permitted, but enjoined as a 
duty, and almost universally observed. The old rule which 
prescribed caution in the ad'inission of candidates^ and a 
careful preparation for the rite was, after the sixth century, 
applicable for the most jDart only to Jemsh, heathen, and 
other proselytes. The discipline which was formerly requi- 
site, preparatory to baptism, now followed this rite." ^ 

The whole of this has been not only conceded but dem- 
onstrated by Dr. Bunsen ^ with remarkable clearness : 

" The Apostolical Church made the school the connect- 
ing Imk between herself and the world. The object of 
this education was admission into the free society, and 
brotherhood of the Christian community. The Church ad- 
hered rigidly to the principle, as constituting the true pur- 
port of the baptism ordained by Christ, that no one can be 
a member of the communion of saints, but by his oi07i free 
act and deed ; his own solemn vow made in presence of the 
Church. It was Avith this understanding that the candidate 
for baptism was immersed in water and admitted as a 
brother upon his confession of the Father, the Son, and the 
Holy Ghost. It understood, therefore, m the exact sense, 



^ Coleman's Christ. Antiq. chap. xiv. sec. 3. 
2 Hippoljtus, vol. ii. pp. 17 9-1 81. 



4 



Buis^SEisr. 115 

1 Peter, iii. 21, not as being a mere bodily purifica- 
tion but as a vow made to God with a good conscience 
through faith in Jesus Christ. This vow was preceded by 
a confession of Christian faith made m the face of the 
Church in which the catechumen expressed that faith in 
Christ and in the sufficiency of the salvation offered by 
Him. It was a vow to live for the time to come to God 
and for his neighbor, not to the world and for self; a vow 
of faith in his becoming a child of God, through the com- 
munion of His only-begotten Son, in the Holy Ghost ; a 
vow of the most solemn kind, for life and for death. The 
keeping of this pledge was the condition of continuance in 
the Church, its infringement entailed repentance or ex-com- 
munication. All Church discipline was based upon this 
voluntary pledge, and the responsibility thereby self-im- 
posed. But how could such a vow be received without ex- 
amination ? How could such examuiation be passed with- 
out instruction and observation ? 

" As a general rule the ancient Church fixed three years 
for this preparation, supposing the candidate, whether 
heathen or Jew, to be competent to receive it. With 
Christian children the condition was the same, except that 
the term of probation was curtailed according to circum- 
stances. Pedobaptism in the more modern sense, meaning 
thereby baptism of new-born infants with the vicarious 
promises of parents or other sponsors, was utterly unknoAvn 
to the early Church not only down to the end of the sec- 
ond, but indeed to the middle of the third century. Wo 
will show in a subsequent page how, toward the close of 
the second century, this practice originated in the baptism 
of chiklren of a more advanced age." 

Neander has shown the derangement produced in the 



116 keander's views. 

"whole church service by the mtroduction of infant bap- 
tism destroying the more ancient rank of the catechumens.^ 
Speaking of the period between Constantine and Gregory 
the Great (a.d. 312-590), says: 

" With reference to the two constituent portions of the 
Church assembhes, the catechumens and baptized behevers, 
the whole service was divided into two portions, one in 
which the catechumens were allowed to join, embracing the 
reading of the Scriptures and the sermon — the prevail- 
mgly didactic portion ; and the other in which the baptized 
alone could take part, embracmg whatever was designed to 
represent the fellowship of believers — ^the communion and 
all the prayers which preceded it.- These Avere called the 
77iissa catecliiimenoTum and the onissa fidelium^ which di- 
vision must of course have fallen into disuse after the gen- 
eral introduction of infant l)aptismP 

The same author has shown from the ancient formularies, 
that they must have originated in a period of the history of 
the Church when infant baptism had no existence, but cate- 
chetical instruction preceded the initiatory rite. 

Some of the questions and answers still preserved by the 
Roman Catholic and Greek Churches, or even by the Church 
of England, and other reformed communions, embalm, as it 
were, within their encrusted folds the dead figure of that 
which once had vitality, the formula of a believing catechu- 
men applying for baptism. It is for this reason that the 
infant is still asked in these forms if he desires to be bap- 
tized ; >-* he renounces the devil and all his works ; if he be- 
lieves all the articles of the Christian faith, and if he will 
obediently keep God's holy will and commandments. Ne- 
ander^ j^^stly says of aU this that it " originated in a period 
1 Church Hist. vol. ii. p. 325. 2 Yq]. ii p. 665. 



HOW IT ORIGIN^ATED. 117 

when infant baptism had as yet no existence, and was after- 
ward applied without alteration to children, because men 
shrunk from undertaking to introduce any change in the 
consecrated formula established by apostolic authority." 

Let any one examine the work known as " The Apostolic 
Constitutions," containing as it does, formularies, enlarged 
indeed, and interpolated as late as the sixth century, but 
presenting, in the main, a fair picture of the Church in the 
third, and he will find the services they give for the ad- 
ministration of baptism to be for adults altogether, and not 
for infants, even while infant baptism is commended by them 
in one or two later passages. 

Nothing is, therefore, more clear than that the whole 
ground on which the divine authority of infant baptism has 
been supposed, by our Pedobaptist brethren, for centuries 
to rest, has utterly given way and been abandoned, not only 
silently by large masses of evangelical Christians in the 
country, but openly and earnestly in argument by nearly 
all those persons of learning in Europe whose studies have 
led them impartially to examine the question in the light of 
the present age. Dr. Bunsen says " we are at this moment 
better able than either the defenders or opponents of infimt 
baptism have hitherto been, to explain how it originaUdP 



§ lY. The Eise of Infant Baptism Traced. 

. Between thirty and forty years ago, when, in England 
and Scotland, Churcli history was under an eclipse even 
among respectable divines. Dr. Chalmers urged the follow- 
ing as a chief argument in favor of infant baptism : 

" There is no satisflxctory historical evidence of our prac- 
tice having ever crept in — the innovation of a later period in 



118 DK. ALEXANDER. 

the history of the Church. Had uifant baptism sprung up 
as a new piece of sectarianism, it would not have escaped 
the notice of the authorship of the times. But there is no 
credible written memorial of its ever havmg entered among 
us as a novelty, and we have, therefore, the strongest reason 
to beheve that it has come down in one uncontrolled tide 
of example and observation from the days of the Apos- 
tles." ' 

Even Dr. Alexander tells us in his Life that he at one time 
gave up baptizmg mfants, but that this was one of those 
" considerations," which he says, " kept me back from joining 
the Baptists, ^. 6., that the universal prevalence of infant 
baptism as early as the fourth and fifth centuries was unac- 
countable on the supposition that no such practice existed 
in the times of the Apostles."^ 

It is just here that the historical researches of impartial 
Pedobaptists, within the last half century, have so fully sub- 
stantiated all that the Baptists had clauned. 

1 Lecture xiv. on Romans. 

2 The other consideration was that " if the Baptists are right, they are 
the only Christian Church on earth, and all other denominations are out of 
the visible Church. Besides I could not see how they could obtain a 
valid baptism." The sentiment of the former clause of this sentence 
has been considered in my little work on Communion. As to the latter 
Dr. Alexander should have been aware that the Roman Catholic Church 
has ever held that "the minister of baptism, in case of necessity, is the 
first person who passes by having the use of his reason of whatever sex 
or religion,''^ and that this necessity even needs not to be extreme, but it 
is sufficient for it to be reasonable. (Dens. Theol. De Baptismo, n. 12, 
3, 4.) So that Dr. Alexander's scrupies were ultra High Church, and 
tending even beyond the Church of Rome itself, to make the validity of 
the sacraments depend on apostolic succession. There is no possibility 
of any Protestant or Papist now assuring himself that there is no defect- 
ive link in his chain of succession, on Dr. Alexander's principles 



JUSTIN MARTYR. 119 

Now, for instance, it is conceded by the most respectable 
authorities, that Justin Martyr (a.d. 140) could have known 
nothing of infant baptism. As Semler says, " From Justin 
Martyr's description of baptism we learn that it was ad- 
ministered only to adults. He says ' we were, corporally, 
born without our will, J^ai' arayjp^ but we are not to remain 
children of necessity and ignorance (as to our birtli), but 
in baptism are to Jiave choice, knowledge, etc. This we 
learned from the apostles.' " 

It seems astonishing that persons could ever have thought 
otherwise concerning this most important Christian writer, 
for not only here have we this distinct assertion that in 
baptism we must have " choice" and " knowledge," but in 
his first apology presented to the emperor, he undertakes 
at length to relate the manner in which we, " having been 
renewed by Christ, dedicate ourselves to God" in baptism. 
He says that those who " are persuaded and believe the 
things taught by us are true and promise to live according 
to them," after praying and fasting and asking God to for- 
give them are " conducted by us to some place where there 
is water," and that " they are then bathed in water (sv tots 
loviQOP noiovviai) in the name of the Lord-God, the Father of 
all, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit." 

INTeander therefore says that Irena3us, a.d. 180, is the first 
Church teacher in whom we find any allusion to infant bap- 
tism, and quotes fi'om that father the following well-kno^\^l 
passage : " He came to redeem all by himself, all wlio through 
him are regenerated to God, infonts, little children, boys, 
young men and old. Hence he passed through every age, 
and for the infants he became an infant, sanctifying the in- 
fents — among the little children he became a little child." * 
^ Church History, vol. i. p. 311. 



120 BU]srsE:N' on iren^us. 

This is now confessed to be the only shadow of reason for 
supposing that infant baptism was ever knoAvn until a period 
much later than the year 200, certainly. But here, all turns 
upon the meaning of the phrase " regenerated to God" in 
the above. If it means " baptize," then infant baptism was 
practiced in the year a.d. 180 ; if not, all proof of it at this 
period falls to the ground. It is not the duty of the author 
to offer an opinion either way, but simply to record those 
of others. But there is certainly no proof that the custom 
had then originated, especially as we have not the original, 
but only a Latin translation of later date. Dr. Sears and 
Dr. Chase have endeavor ocl to show that Irena3us " gener- 
ally employs the word 'regeneration' to designate the 
general work of Christ in redeeming the human race," and 
hence that there is here no ground for believing that in his 
time infant baptism had been introduced.^ But as both of 
these are Baptists, it would be contrary to the object of 
this volume to quote their arguments. Dr. Sears, however, 
refers to Baumgarten — Crusius, Winer, Rossler, and Mun- 
scher, aU German authorities of high rank, and who, though 
not Baptists, deny that any thing in Irenseus proves the 
existence of infant baptism. Dr. Krabbe declares that this 
passage " will hardly bear criticism," and Dr. Bunsen is 
decidedly of this opinion. 

If this be so, we have no allusion to the baptism of infants, 
at any rate until after the beginning of the third century of 
the Christian era. Let any one think of the changes two 
hundred years have wrought in the customs and opinions 
of Christians in New England, and then say if two thou- 
sand years hence, because some antiquarian should read in 

^ See Christian Review, vol. iii. p. 206. Chase's Design of Baptism, 
pp. 67-85 



TERTULLIAN ^BUNSEX. 121 

a work of this day, of chiirclies fitted up with gas and bap- 
tistries, organs, and choirs, that therefore he would justly 
infer that choirs, organs, gas, and baptism by immersion, 
were all known and approved by the Pilgrim Fathers. 

We now come down to TertuUian, a.d. 200, who strongly 
protests agcdnst the baptism of young persons. But it has 
generally been taken for granted by Pedobaptists, that he 
was arguing against infant ba23tism in the strict sense of 
the word, and hence they have urged that he must have 
been well acquainted with the system, that this opinion was 
but that of an individual, while his opposition proves the 
prevalence of the custom. Neander, however remarks on 
his testimony : " TertuUian appears as a zealous opponent 
of infant baptism, a proof that the practice had not as yet 
come to be regarded as an apostolical mstitution, for other- 
wise he would hardly have ventured to express himself so 
strongly against it. * * * He says, ^Let them first 
lecirn to feel their need of salvation^ so it may appear that 
we have given to those that wanted."^ Tertulhan evidently 
means," continues ISTeander, " that children should be led to 
Christ by instructing them in Christianity, but that they 
should not receive baptism until after havmg been sufficiently 
instructed, they are led from personal conviction, and by 
their own free choice to seek for it with the sincere longing 
of the'heart."' 

But Bunsen sliows that TertuUian was not arguing against 
infant baptism at all, then unknown, but of " little grooving 
children from six to ten years old," who could " go down 
^ with the other catechumens into the baptismal bath, but 
were not yet in a state to make the proper responses." The 
custom was coming into fashion, but TertuUian '' rejects" it, 

^ Church History, vol. i. p. 312, 
6 



122 OEIGEN. 

quoting tlie well-knowii passage/ as folloT^s : " For it is de- 
sirable to 230stpone baptism according to the position and 
disjDOsition of each individual, as well as in reference to his 
age, but especially so in the case of children. Where is 
the necessity for placing the sponsors in jeopardy, who may 
be prevented by death from performmg their j^romises, or 
may be deceived by the breaking out of an evil disposition. 
It is true that our Lord said, " Huider them not from coming 
unto me," but they may do so when they have arrived at 
the age of puberty, they may do so when they have begun 
to learn, and have learned to whom they are going. Why 
should they at that innocent age hasten to have their sins 
forgiven them ? Ought we to act with less circumsj)ection 
than m worldly matters, and allow those who are not in- 
trusted with earthly property to be intrusted with heavenly? 
Whoever attaches to baptism the importance it deserves, 
T\dll be afraid rather of being too hasty than too procrasti- 
nating. True faith is sure of salvation." This, contmues 
Bunsen, "is the way in which Tertullian treats the subject 
of baptism of groAvmg children. What would he have said 
to the application of Christ's words to the case of infants ?" ^ 

There is no proof, then, of a smgie case of infant baptism 
up to the close of the second century, 

Origen, a.d. 230-250, speaks indeed of an apostolical tra-J 
dition to give baptism even to little children [parvulis], but* 
Neander justly remarks in regard to this declaration, that 
it is " an expression which can not have much weight in this 
age, when the mclination was so strong to trace every msti- j 
tution vrhich was considered of special imjDortance, to the 1 
Apostles, and when so many walls of separation, hinderingi 
the freedom of prospect, had already been set up between 
^ De Baptismo, c. 18. 2 Hippoljtus, vol. iii. p. 194. 



BUNSEN OK ORIGEN. 123 

this and the apostoHc age." The same author also shows 
that "in Origen's time, too, difficulties were frequently 
urged against infant baptism, similar to those thrown out 
by TertuUian," and that we are not to mfer from any single 
expressions of this kind, that it was ever in customary use, 
but to remember that long after infant baptism " was ac- 
knowledged in theory, it was still very far from being 
uniformly recognized in practice." ^ 

But Bunsen fully ex]3lains the cause of this reference to 
apostolical tradition, showing that it simply alludes to the 
verse " Suffer the little children [parvuli] to come unto ]iie," 
and from the passage before quoted, that in both of these 
cases, the reference is to " little groioing children from six 
to ten years oldy^ 

" TertuUian' s opposition is to the baptism of young grow- 
ing children ; he does not say one loord about new-horn in- 
fants. Neither does Origen^ lohen his expressions are ac- 
curately weighed, Cyprian, and some other African bishops, 

^ Yol. i. p. 314. 

"^ " This, then, is also the true interpretation of this and of the other two 
passages in Origen where the same word occurs. A comparison with 
what appears to have been considered apostolical tradition before the 
time of Origen, slwws that no other interpretation is admissoMe, The 
Text Book speaks of those who go down with the other catechumens irito the 
baptismal hath, but are not yet in a state to make the proper responses. In 
that case, the parents are bound to do it for them. This is undoubtedly 
the " apostolical practice to which Origen refers, for it was to the Church 
of Alexandria that he particularly belonged. In this ordinance the 
whole arrangement seems to be an exceptional one, and so it is in Origen, 
for ho says the " little ones also^ When the Church instituted Pedobap- 
tism (in the sense of children from six to ten years of age), she doubtless 
had before her eyes our Lord's affectionate words referred to likewise by 
Origen on the occasion, and the divines of the sixteenth century soor 
found themselves obhged to revert to thorn." Hippolytus, vol. iii. pp. 192, 39. 



124 AUGUSTIXE. 

his cotemporaries, at tlie close of the third century, were the 
first who viewed baptism in the hght of a wasliing away of 
the universal sinfulness of human nature, and connected this 
idea with the ordinance of circumcision." ^ 

By Cyprian the rightfuhiess of mfant baptism was urged 
on the people, upon the groimd of circumcision, which ar- 
gument was at about this time first introduced. But these 
views were then confined to the clergy of IS'orth Africa, 
where infant baptism origmated in the manner which 
Neander has sho^vn. Speaking of the j^eriod from Tertul- 
lian to Cyprian, he says : 

" The error became more firmly established, that without 
external baptism no one could be delivered from that in- 
herent guilt, could be saved from the everlasting punishment 
that threatened him, or raised to eternal life ; and when 
the notion of a magical influence, or charm connected with 
the sacraments, continually gained ground, the theory was 
finally evolved of the unconditional necessity of infant bap- 
tism. About the middle of the third century this theory 
was already generally admitted in the IN'orth African Church. 
The only question that remained was whether the child 
ought to be baptized immediately after its birth, or not till 
eight days after, as in the case of the rite of circumcision." * 

And yet it is certain that, after the middle of the fourth 
century, the baptism of Augustine, the son of the pious 
Monica, was put ofiT in his childhood, under circumstances 
that Augusti considers to shoAV that his baptism, with so I 
Httle preparation, " would have been an exception to the 
general rule on this subject."^ 

All kinds of superstitions and ceremonies rapidly accumu- 

1 Hipolytus, vol. iii. p. 195. 2 Church History, vol. i. p. 313. 

3 Coleman's Christian Antiquities, chap. 2, sec. 5. 



INFANT COMMUNION. 125 

lated around infant baptism in proportion as the custom 
gradually extended ; for some of the details of which the 
curious may consult '' Hart's Ecclesiastical Antiquities," and 
similar works. At length, in Ireland, the land of saints, 
every father baptized his own child, as soon as it was born, 
in milh^ that it might be mild in disposition, immersmg the 
whole body, except always the right arm, " that he might 
he strong in war.'''^ From the time of Cyprian, infant com- 
munion spread side by side with infant baptism ; and we 
find revolting details of children made sick by the bread 
and wine forced into their mouths. This continued several 
centuries. So late as a.d. 957, Elfric, in his address to the 
priesthood in England, says : " Ye should give the eucharist 
to children when they are baptized, and let them be brought 
to mass that they may receive it all the seven days that 
they are unwashed." ^ Thus is the origin and progress of 
this error clearly traceable from the most authentic Pedo- 
baptist sources. 

One thing alone remams to be accounted for. Whence, 
in so spiritual a religion as Christianity, came this super- 
stitious reverence for the ordinances of religion ? Even 
this it is not difficult to trace. Our Saviour insists much 
upon the confession of Ilbn before men. The disposition 
to do this, in whatever way he may choose to make known 
his will, even at the cost of life, he makes an essential part 
of Christian character. But in practical life the disposition 
to confess can only be proved by the act of confession. 
Hence baptism, as the public avowal of Christ, came very 
early to be considered essential to being " a complete'''' or 
^^ perfect Christian." The multitudes who delayed it on 
account of persecution hicreased this tendency ; Avhile the 
i Hart's Ecclesiastical Records, p. 188. 



126 BAPTISMAL EEGENERATIOlSr. 

decision of character, and consequent peace it gave to those 
who embraced it, probably helped to foster the superstition 
that by degrees attached to the mere act itself. Soon, 
therefore, the former sins were not thought to be generally 
washed away mitil the moment of baptism, however mani- 
:^st the faith in Christ before. Thus it came to be esteemed 
essential to salvation, not indeed without faith, but when 
accompanied by it, mystically washing away all sins up to 
the moment of its administration. Hence, too, sins after 
baptism were forgotten by the Church with difficulty. Thus 
came the common delay of multitudes of men to be baptized 
till j ust before death, as was the case with Constantine, Then 
the counteracting zeal of the Church was awakened. Pious 
parents first encouraged their children to place themselves 
as catechumens very early in life, and then the parents 
placed them as such at six or seven, and even earlier. At 
the close of the second, and all through the third and fourth 
centuries, there were increased classes of children catechu- 
mens. But these children, if allowed to wait until they 
grew up, would still, in superstitious dread of sins committed 
after baptism, defer that rite until a deathbed, as the ex- 
hortation of Basil, already quoted (a.d. 379) shows. 

Hence the clergy, in a mistaken zeal to multiply members, 
and dreading lest a rite, to which so much importance was 
now attached, should be delayed for a precarious deathbed, 
encroached with their baptism, as they easily could through 
their influence over the flexible minds of the children cate- 
chumens, aided by the blind zeal of parental piety, earlier 
and earlier into the years of childhood. From boys of ten, 
who might sometimes be volunteers, and possibly give evi- 
dences of sincere piety, they advanced to take in those of 
six or seven responded for by others, though able to descend 



41 



CAUSE OF SUPERSTITION, 127 

unaided into the Avater with the adult catechimiens. Then 
those of three or four, when just able to repeat a few of the 
sacred words, as Gregory ISTazianzen recommends, were, by 
a further corruption, brought by baptism into the fold of 
the Church. From this very circumstance would arise the 
strongest argument for going a step further. For, since in 
these very young children baptism could not be a profession 
of personal faith, it could only lead the masses to suppose 
that it acted as a charm, and that the child was made more 
safe in case of death, a view carefully cherished by the 
clergy. Thus arose the belief that all^ even infants, dy- 
ing without baptism, would be lost; and hence followed 
finally the baptism of babes of eight days old, and even 
those of a day. The first hnoimi instance of this last is 
A.D. 252, in North Africa, but it was by "slow degrees 
only, and with much difiiculty, that all this entered into 
the Church life," until after the year 400, as ISTeander 
has shoAvn. Down to the middle of the fourth century, 
many, like Basil, Gregory Nazianzen, Chrysostom, and 
Augustine, whose parentage would have rendered infant 
baptism certain had it been usual, were not baptized till 
they became adults, even where dedicated to God most 
solemnly by parental jjiety in their infancy, " like Samuel." 
The concessions of such authorities as Augusti, ISTeander, 
Bunsen, and a host of others, Mly sustain this view of the 
origin of infant baptism and its efiicacy. 

To most Christians, indeed, the chief difiiculty mil be to un- 
derstand how those who concede so much concede no more ; 
how they can give up the Divine authority of infant bap- 
tism and yet retain the practice. After making all allow- 
ance for early associations and the difiiculty and dread of 
cutting the Church loose from a system time-honored and 



128 DECKEASE OF INFANT BAPTISM. 

remote, this must still be considered a humiliating fact. 
The masses of those who continue to practice it, do so be- 
cause they regard it as most unquestionably a Divine insti- 
tution. They draw mferences from it of the most objec- 
tionable theological character, because they so esteem it. 
Surely those who know better, and who perceive these 
dangers, should not content themselves with protesting 
against the inferences, but should abandon what they own 
to be the unscriptural practice, from wliich these are so nat- 
urally drawn. 

§ Y. Decrease or Infant Baptism. 

It only remains that we now trace the progress, during 
the last hundred years, of Anti-Pedobaptist views among 
the masses of the Christian people — among those, in fact, 
who, guided chiefly by the ]N'ew Testament and conscience, 
have, after great conflict with early prejudices, adopted the 
baptism of believers as alone scriptural, or at least rehn- 
quished that of infants as erroneous and injurious. 

In Prussia, where the Baptists have suffered much perse- 
cution, it has been proposed recently, by many of the clergy, 
to do away with the requirement of infant baptism to mem- 
bership m the National Church. There are now in Ger- 
many more than five thousand Baptist members, Tvdth about 
four hundred and fifty preaching stations, and about sixty 
preachers to supply them, under the care of the American 
Baptist Missionary Union. About seven hundred were 
baptized in 1854. In addition to this are the Mennonites, 
and others known in history. 

In England the increase of the Baptist denomination, 
though regular and satisfactory, has presented no very re- 
markable national results of late years at home. But the 



IjS'ceease of baptists. 129 

success of their missions abroad, together with their zeal in 
circulating translations of the sacred Scriptures, have given 
a degree of currency and power to Baptist sentiments, 
throughout India, which it is not easy to estimate, but far 
beyond what now appears from the numbers baptized. In 
the West Indies are some of the largest Baptist Churches 
in the whole world. In Scotland, though increasing, the 
Baptists are few, so few, indeed, that the organ of the Free 
Church has not feared publicly to admit the unscriptural 
character of infant baptism, to the extent that we have seen. 
But it is in this country, where religion is most free, that 
the change has been the most steady and decisive. Ever 
since 1790, a tide of emigration has been coming in from 
Europe: very few, comparatively, have been Baptists. 
Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Metho- 
dists, have all received greater accessions in this way. Had 
the Baptists kept up in proportion to the mcrease of popu- 
lation, it might have seemed as much as could have been 
expected. But there were in the United States — 

In 1792, a,bout 1 Baptist communicant to every 56 inhabitants. 
In 1812, ''1 " '^ *' ' 38 " 

In 1832, " 1 " " " 33 " 

In 1854, " 1 " " " 30 « 

In addition to this, there are many Freewill Baptists, Men- 
nonites, and Campbellitcs, making the proportion of 1 com- 
municant to every 22 of the whole population belonging to 
churches which reject infant baptism. They have also 
ministers and accommodations for upward of 3,500,000, out 
of about 14,000,000, the whole Church accommodation of 
tlie United States ; or mo^^e than one quarter of the lohole. 
It is not, however, from statistics of this kind that a full 



130 :m:etiiodists. 

idea of the progress of Baptist principles is to "be gathered. 
We ah know that infant baptism has been greatly faUiug 
into disnse among aU evaugehcal denominations. Perhaps 
this decHne has been the greatest among the Methodists. 
Bnt they appear to preserve no statistics of their baptisms 
as a denomhiation, none certainly in then* general annual 
reports: a fact which in itself shows its uselessness in their 
sight, and incongruity with then- evangehcal prmciples.^ 
Occupied intently with the one great truth of regeneration 
by the Spirit, and not originally considering themselves a 
Church, but only a voluntary Society in a Church, the prin- 
ciple of then' foundation has had a strono-er hold upon them 
than even the teachings of their founder. Hence they now 
appear to welcome those who beheve in intant baptism, or 
baptism only on a profession of faith. Their Book of Dis- 
cipline, it is true, would bind them to receive none who do 
not ''promise to observe and keep the rules of the Church," 
of which infant baptism is one. But, practically, none are 
refused admission simply for neglecting this rite. Among 
Episcopalians, on the other hand, their strongly ritual ten- 
dencies at the present day render the number of their in- 
fants baptized out of all proportion to their actual com- 
mimicants. 

1 It is not a hundred years ago since John "Wesley, defending infant 
sprinkhng, Tvrote: "By baptism Tre enter into covenant with God into 
that everlasting covenant which he hath commanded forever, * * * 
are admitted into the Church, and consequently made members of Christ 
as its Head. * * * "We who were by nature children of wrath are 
made children of God • * * * and if children then heirs with God, 
and joint heirs with Christ." (Wesley's ^^.lisceUaneous "VTorks, vol. ii. pp. 
157, 8.) None of our Methodist brethren would use such language now. 
The drawings of a higher and more spiritual regeneration have silently 
absorbed their interest from this rite. 



I 



CONGREGATIONALISTS. 131 

They baptize the infants of the whole congregation, but 
even for this tlie proportion is very large, being about forty 
thousand reported to the last General Convention where 
their whole Church accommodation in the United States is 
but six hundred and forty-four thousand five hundred and 
ninety-eight, being just one infant baptized for every sixteen 
persons, that their Churches will seat. The Episcopahans, 
however, are but a small denommation, confined chiefly to 
cities, and less fairly represented by the numbers then' edi- 
fices will seat than any others except, perhaps, the Roman 
Catholics. 

Among the Congregationalists, while their last " Tear 
Book" is a most valuable document, and shows clearly their 
prosperity in many points of view, it gives no statistics of 
infant baptism, but in place of them the following resolution : 

" Vbted^ That a committee of three be appointed to as- 
certain the existing facts in reference to the baptism of in- 
fants in our churches, to inquire after the causes of the 
neglect of infant baptism, and to present a report at the 
next meeting of the body." 

More significant, hoAvever, if indeed there is not some 
omission of the printer, is a confession of Faith of the Con- 
gregational Association of Minnesota, published at page 264, 
of this work, the thirteenth article, reading as follows : 

"Art. 13. We believe that the sacraments of the ISTew 
Testament are baptism and the Lord's supper, that believers 
of regular Church standing only can consistently partake 
of the Lord's supper, and that visible believers be admitted 
to the ordinance of baptism ^"^ 

Nor is tliere a word in favor of hi&nt baptism. Li a re- 
cent number of the " Journal of Commerce," the Boston 
correspondent chronicles it as quite a marked event in that 



132 DECPvEASE OF INFAXT BAPTISM. 

city, that "three mfants were baptized" on the pre™us 
Sabbath, and adds : 

''In our Congregational Churches we fear that there is 
considerable indifference and neglect in reference to infant 
baptism. In one of our oldest churches in this State there 
had not been, a few years since, an instance of infant bap- 
tism for the seven preceding years. Last year there were 
seventy Congregational Churches in 'New HamjDshire that 
reported no infant bajDtism. This year ninety-six churches, 
or about one half in the State, report none. If this indif- 
ference contmues the ordinance ^vill become extmct in the 
Congregational Churches." 

"We have heard it rumored that in a church near New 
York upward of fifty have ^''joined under icritten protesV* 
against that rite. The following more cautiously worded 
acknovrledgment of the same facts is made in an editorial 
which recently appeared in the " Xew York Independent," a 
jDaper that boasts of twenty thousand subscribers, and is 
edited by several leadmg Congregational ministers : 

" In some cases it is afiii*med that this neglect has spread 
so widely, and has become so habitual in the absence of a 
pastor, or through his tacit consent to the omission, that 
the instances of baptism among the children of Church mem- 
bers are the exception rather than the rule^ and that the ef- 
forts to revive it meet with, coolness or opposition. The 
members of such churches doubt the propriety of adminis- 
tering the ordinance to any but adults and m their own 
practice conform to theii' convictions." 

The reasons assigned for this neglect are, if possible more 
significant than the facts, proving how essentialy extraneous 
to evangelical religion is the whole system.^ 

^ " "We can not particularly blame this when we reflect how sUght a 



PRESBYTERIANS. 133 

The Reformed Dutch Church, according to its statistics 
in 1853, baptized one infant to every fifteen and one fifth 
communicants. 

Perhaps the Presbyterians have maintained the discipline 
of their Church more thoroughly than most other denomi- 
nations for a series of years, and preserved their records 
with more care. But unfortunately there are no statistics 
back of the year 1827 that will enable us to determine 
the progress or decline of infant baptism among them. 
In that year the number of infants baptized was already 
feioer than the number of adults received on a profession 
of religion, being m the folio wig proportion in the years 
stated. In 

1827 there were 10 infants sprinkled to 12 added on examination. 

1828 " 10 " " 15 '' '' 

1829 " 12 " " 14 '' " 

Indeed if we take all their baptisms, both of adults and in- 
fants together, for the three years above, they barely exceed 
the number of those received into communion, being only 
in the proportion of forty-three to forty-two/ 

For twenty years the whole number of their baptisms 
of adults and infants put together have probably but lit- 
tle exceeded the number of their admissions on a profes- 

place this ordinance has had in either the doctrinal expositions or the 
forms of rehgious worship common among our churches. Frequently the 
baptized child is treated, from first to last, by his parents, by the minister, 
by the church itself, which stand around liim at his baptism, precisely as 
if no such rite had been administered ; while the service itself, as we 
have said, is sniffed out of sight with a hasty observance that as nearly 
as possible intimates contempt for it." — Ne.w York Tndejoendeni, Septemler^ 
1854. ^ See Appendix A. 



134 DECREASE OF INFANT BAPTISM. 

sion of faith. In some years they have simk much below. 
For instance, there were in 

1832 13 infants, or 22 infants and adults, to 34 added on examination. 

1833 14 " 21 " " " 23 " " '' 

These figures, however, are less to be rehed on because 
there are m all churches seasons of revival when large num- 
bers are admitted, and seasons of declension in which or- 
dinances may be maintained ^yiih regularity, while but few 
make a profession of personal piety. But the general re- 
sult shows that the declme of mfant baptism among them 
must be very great. 

A fairer way of examining statistics of this kind is to take 
the per centage of infant baptisms to the whole body of the 
communicants. The foUo^Tuig are the results of such an 
estimate. In 

1827 1 infant was baptized to every 13i communicants. 

1828 1 " " '' " 13| " 

1829 1 ^* " " " 131 " 

At this period, therefore, it would seem that the average 
yearly number of baptisms was about one to thirteen and 
one third. But m 1837, ten years later, and just before 
the di^dsion of the Church into its two present organiza- 
tion of old and new school, the proportion of mfant bap- 
tisms to the number of the commimicants was one to eight- 
een and four fifths. This would indicate a very rapid decline. 

The old school Presbyterians have always been more con- 
servative than the new, especially of observances hke this. 
Hence, in the year 1839, after the separation was complete, 
the statistics mdicate some temporary check to this de- 
crease among them, and there was one infant baptism to 



PEESBYTEEIAiSrS. 135 

sixteen and three fifths communicants. But in 1853, it had 
fallen, in the old school branch of the denomination alone, 
to one in eighteen and four fifths, and in 1854 to one in 
eighteen and seven tenths. 

The statistics of the new school branch began in 1838, 
and exhibit one baptism to twenty-two and seven tenths of 
the communicants. This, however, had fallen in 1853, the 
last year of which we have seen statistics, to one in thirty- 
four and seven tenths! That is, where in 1827 there were 
ten baptisms to every one hundred and thirty-five communi- 
cants, in 1853 there are four baptisms to every one hun- 
dred and forty communicants ! 

But if we add, as we ought to do in an estimate of the 
whole period, the tables of the old and new school bodies 
together, then the infant baptisms have decreased in seven- 
teen years fi'om one in thirteen and one fifth to one in 
twenty-two and three tenths. 

Or to make the matter more palpable, supposing that in 
1827 every Presbyterian infant was duly baptized, it would 
follow that now one hundred and fifty-two thousand seven 
hundred and ninety-two of their members were living in ne- 
glect of that ceremony. So that the practice has decreased 
among them about one half in twenty years. 

Let us next multiply the number of communicants by 
four^ and it will give us fairly the whole amount of men, 
women, and children, belonging to strictly Presbyterian 
families, just as the census Avould take them, and coming 
witlnn the scope of infant baptism as now generally admin- 
istered. This would give a population of one million four 
hundred and tliirty eight tliousand eight hundred and sixty 
in 1853. 

The last census returns give one birth in the year to 



136 DECREASE OF IKFAISTT BAPTISM 

every thirty-three inhabitants, but these are admitted to be 
quite defective. In Boston, indeed, the increase has been 
found to be about 07ie to every twenty-six. In England and 
Wales the average has been considered about one birth to 
every thirty-one mhabitants, and in this country the in- 
crease is larger. But according to this estimate there 
were forty-six thousand four hundred and fourteen Presby- 
terian children born, less than one third of whom, fifteen 
thousand six hundred and seventy-six, were baptized. But 
the Prussian returns give one birth to every twenty-six mhab- 
itants. This would give about fifty-five thousand births, of 
whom about forty thousand are unbaptized.^ 

And further, a hundred years ago it was not only the 
serious Presbyterians who had their infants sprinkled, but 
as now in Scotland even the most worldly. Many who 
rarely set foot in a church of any kmd, would yet bring 
their children forward. 

There is still another clearer method of exhibiting the 
decrease of infant baptism. By the late census the whole 
church accommodation of this country for all those denom- 
inations who baptize infants, is ten million six hundred and 
fifty-eight thousand six hundred and thirty-one, of which the 

^ The average of "births is exceedingly hard to estimate. The regis- 
tratioD of them in England and Wales has ever been, and probably now 
is, below the truth. There, the population has about doubled in the last 
fifty years, in spite of war, emigration, and deaths. In Prussia there were, 
according to an account before me in 1849, six hundred and ninety-one 
thousand five hundred and sixty-two births to sixteen million three hun- 
dred and thirty-one thousand one hundred and eighty-seven population, or 
one birth to twenty-three and three fifths. The statistical reports of Prus- 
sia seem to me the most reliable. If we suppose the births to be one in 
twenty-six in Prussia, the estimated average, they are probably not less 
than one in twenty -five in this country. 






IINT THE UNITED STATES. 137 

Presbyterians have two million sei^enty-nine thousand six 
hundred and ninety. If, then, they baptized in 1853 fifteen 
thousand six hundred and seventy-six, and all other Pedobap- 
tist denommations in the same proportion, it would give, as 
the total number of infants sprinkled in the United States in 
that year, about eighty thousand. Supposing the popula- 
tion that year to have been twenty-five millions, there 
would have been, according to the English tables, eight 
hundred thousand children born to eighty thousand baptized. 
But by the Prussian tables, upward of nine hundred and 
sixty thousand children were born, that is, more than twelve 
infants horn to one baptized^ by all denominations^ the 
whole country through,^ 

In one sentence, then, infant baptism is now completely 
the exception where it used to be the rule. If the Presbyte- 
rian returns furnish a fair average, out of twelve infants 
born, eleven go unbaptized. A hundred years ago the pro- 
portions were nearer the reverse. [Appendix B.] 



CHAPTEE V. 

IMMEESION ALWAYS THE BAPTISM OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

In the year 1841 Bishop Smith of the Ej)iscopal Church 
in Kentucky was publicly declared by his own brethren to 
be the author of a letter in the " Church Record," sayhig 

1 The Roman Catholics, as well as the Episcopalians, baptize a larger 
proportion of their inflmts than the Presbyterians. But the first named 
are only to the Methodists as six to forty- three, estimated by church ac- 
commodations ; and these last as well as the Congregationalists are far 
more lax in this matter tlum the Presbyterians. 



138 BISHOP SMITH. 

that lie and many of his western brethren were "con- 
strained to admit immersion to have been semper^ ithique^ 
et ah omnibus ^'^'' and as " being exceedingly galled by the 
argu77%entimi ad honime^n — if you believe in immersion, 
why do you not practice it ; or, at least, why do you not 
yourself submit to it ?" To this last question, which he 
confesses to have been " often posed with," he " hnows of 
no answer'^'' but the want of a succession of immersed ad- 
ministrators in the Episcopal Church. " How enviable," he 
continues, " is the position of the Greek and Asiatic 
Churches ! And how deeply to be deplored the condition 
to which Protestantism is reduced by this [sprinkHng] 
among the many other departures from the Catholic 
Church, of the great Roman schism !" 

Afterwards, in a letter published by his " leave, and 
under his own proper signature," he says : " I do fully and 
unhesitatingly believe that no instance either of adult or 
infant baptism occurred during the first three centuries ex- 
cept by immersion, save only in the few cases of clinic bap- 
tism, and that to this practice all the incidental notices of 
Holy Scripture best conform." He believes that " God in 
his wise providence has permitted the rise of the various 
sects of Baptists for the purpose of ultimately restoring the 
primitive mode of baptism." 

Dr. Anthon of Columbia College declares that " the 
primary meanmg of the word ^amCCoj is to c7z}:), or im7ners,e^ 
and its secondary meanings, if ever it had any, all refer in 
some way or other to the same leading idea. SpriiiJclmg^ 
etc., are entirely out of the question." 

If from the Episcopal Church we turn to the Presbyte- 
rian, we can not forget that Dr. Campbell declared, about 
fifty years ago, that the word BamiQeiv^ both in sacred au- 



BAPTISM IMMERSION. 139 

thors and in classical, signifies to dip^ to plunge^ to im- 
merse^ and that "it is always construed suitably to this 
meaning." 

We are not aware of a single writer of Church History 
who has expressed a doubt on this point. ^N'eander says 
that, "In respect to the form of baptism, it was in conform- 
ity with the original institution, and the original import 
of the symbol, performed by immersion as a sign of entire 
baptism into the Holy Spirit, and of being entirely pene- 
trated by the same." ^ Mosheim declares that in the first 
century " baptism was administered in convenient places, 
without the public assemblies, and by immersing the candi- 
date wholly in water." ^ 

Among the Germans, where the controversy has not 
been much agitated, this concession is most freely made. 
Winer, Tholuch, Hhan, Augusti, and many others, say, as 
Jacobi says,' " the whole body was immersed in water." 

To this it must be added that the Greek Church does 
now, and always has, required immersion, holding that 
nothing else can be baptism. As Professor Stuart says : 

"The mode of baptism by immersiop the Oriental 
Church has always continued to preserve, even down to 
the present time. * * They maintain that /^aTri/gw can 
7nean nothing hut immerge.'^'' * 

Even the Roman Catholics frequently urge it as a deci- 
sive argument against all Pedobaptist Protestants, that they 
do not immerse ; arguing that sprinkling is only a substi- 
tute introduced on the authority of the Church, and that 
originally baptism was by immersion alone. In fact, the 
vast preponderance of evidence of all Christians, even of 

* Histary, vol. i. p. 310. ^ Eccl. History, cent. 1. part ii. chap. 4. 

^ Kitto's Cyc. Art. Baptism. ^ Bib. Repos. April, 1833, p. 360. 



140 PROFESSOR STUART. 

those practicing infant baptism, is most decisively in favor 
of all the baptisms of Scripture having been by immersion. 
And Professor Stuart, as we shall see, admits that there is 
not a single case in the ISTew Testament irreconcilable with 
this supposition. Even when endeavoring to show the 
mode of baptism unimportant, his arguments are chiefly 
derived from the spiritual nature of Christianity rendering 
all forms non-essential, thus curiously coming round to the 
chief error of Popery, ^. e., taking for granted that baptism 
and salvation are so far connected that what is essential to 
the one is essential to the other ! 

I^early all the rest of his argument is based, in truth, as 
we shall see, on this fallacy, that if a Greek word ever has 
more senses belonging to it than its one most usual mean- 
mg, it can never be supposed, without demonstrative proof, 
to be used in less than the whole complement of its possible 
significations at the same time. 

Thus far have Baptist principles been fully conceded by 
the most enlightened of other denominations, in theory at 
least. Were each of these admissions but universally acted 
upon — were baptism delayed until the only proper time of 
full communion, ^. 6., that of personal faith, and were im- 
mersion alone practiced, every division might be done 
away, and all Christians have now, as at first, " one Lord, 
one faith, and one baptism." 



BOOK II. 

CONTROVERTED PRINCIPLES. 

We turn now to consider those principles which form 
the chief points of controversy remaining between Baptists 
and other denominations. 

1. The Command to Baptize a Command to Immerse. 

2. The Importance of Behever's Baptism. 

3. Infant Baptism Injurious as well as Unscriptural. 

4. Mixed Communion Unwise and Injurious. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE COMMAND TO BAPTIZE A COMMAND TO IMMERSE. 

§ I. Ordinary use of /?a7rn^w. 

To persons not versed in this controversy, the subject of 
the present chapter and that of the foregoing will appear 
so nearly alike, that none, it might be almost presumed, 
who would admit what has been shown to be conceded in 
the former, would question what we are still obliged to call 
controverted ground. Yet such a supposition would be 

m 



142 THE COMMAND TO BAPTIZE 

erroneous. Many excellent Christians, freely admitting 
that primitive baptism was performed only by immersion, 
yet suppose that the command to be baptized may now be 
validly fulfilled in other ways. Many more who admit the 
exceptions to immersion, if any, to have been extremely 
rare and guarded, yet take the same ground. The word 
^ttTTT/Jw, they say, though primarily and ahnost always 
meaning to '' di2:)^'^^ to " immerse^'^'' or to ^^ piling e^^'^ has in 
some few cases other signilications, less specific as to mode, 
and from this they infer that the command of Christian bap- 
tism may therefore be fulfilled without immersion. The 
object of the present chapter will be to show the progress 
of opinion upon this subject, and how far the discussions of 
the last hundred years have reduced the points of difiiculty 
and tended to establish those views for which the Baptists 
have usually contended. It will, first of all, be necessary 
to show how far the general principles and laws of interpre- 
tation that have been developed by the Biblical studies of such 
men as Professor Stuart and others, enable us to limit mth 
precision the meaning of a divine command, even though the 
principal words of that command may each have several 
distinct senses. After this is done, it will be proper to in- 
quire if it has been proved, during the last hundred years, 
that ^itniiOx) ever has actually in Greek literature any mean- 
ing which does not necessarily involve the idea of immer- 
sion. The specific instances in which alone scholars like 
Professor Stuart and Kobinson contend that it is not in- 
volved in the literal meanmg of the word, are very few. 
Apart from the rite of Christian baptism, and one or two 
that will prove figurative uses, these cases amount but to 
about seven in the whole comjDass of Greek literature. 
None of these belong to classic Greek, but are found either 



A COMMAKD TO IMMERSE. 143 

in the Bible or Apocrypha. Tliey can, therefore, mth a 
little attention, be tolerably well estimated, even by those 
not acquainted with the original. Perhaps the sense of this 
term will thus be found quite as specific and certain as the 
English word " dipP 

If, at sea, the captain of a sloop-of-war were to order one 
of the hands " to dip a bucket overboard," would any one 
doubt the meaning of the word "cf^p.^" But if, thereupon, 
the sailor merely suspended the bucket a few minutes out- 
side the vessel, where the waves might splash and wet it 
with their spray, and then were gravely to assert that he 
had obeyed the order, and dipped the bucket as he was 
instructed, would the captain hesitate to assert on oath, if 
necessary, before a court-martial, that the man had utterly 
neglected to obey the command given ? 

But suppose the accused were to plead, in justification, 
that he had found a copy of Milton's works in the Hbrary 
of the forecastle, and had read in " Comus" a passage which 
fully justified his construction of the command, as follows : 

" A cold shuddering dew 
Bi'ps me all o'er," 

Suppose he should urge hence, that it was clear the word 
dip in the order given was quite ambiguous, and might 
mean merely to bedew or to sprinkle ; if he should produce 
the various meanings of the word, given in Webster's Dic- 
tionary, in proof of the ambiguity of the command, and 
particularly his fifth signification, ^. 6., " to moisten," " to 
wet," and argue thence that nothing more was decided by 
the verb used than that liquid was to be applied in some 
way to the bucket, but that it mattered not how : — suppose 
he were even to argue on this basis, that the word " dip" 



144 DIP A:?^D ^aniL'Qb), 

did not intimate any thing as to mode^ but merely conveyed 
the idea of "moistening," or of ''purification;" would it 
not be instantly rephed that the meanuig of the word "dip" 
must be determined by its common icsage^ and the general 
mamier of speaking, where no special reason for supposmg 
an exception was shown. Would it not be urged that almost 
all words are used sometimes in different senses, but by a 
well-known prmciple of language and of common sense, 
each word, although it should possess a dozen distinct 
meanings, can have but one of these significations at the 
same time, so that in interpreting a command we are not at 
hberty to affix to each word all of its possible senses, or to 
j^ick out fi'om among them any one that may suit our 
pleasure, but the meanmg of a command is always that 
sio^nification of each word which the most common usao^e 
in such cases shows to have been intended by the speaker, 
exceptional meanings requii-ing specific proof in proportion 
to their rarity. 

Xow m place of the English word " dip" let the reader 
put its exact equivalent in Greek, (?«7it/^w, and he will have 
before him an illustration of the real question whether 
the command to baptize is a command to immerse, as it has 
developed itself, esj^ecially during the last hundred years, 
through the researches of such critics even as Professors 
Stuart and Robinson. There is only this difference, that 
there has not been produced from the whole compass of ^ 
Greek fiterature, a single instance in which ^ami'Qb) is used | 
in so figurative a manner as our English word " dip," in the i 
instance quoted from the ^ratings of Milton.^ Apart from 
its use in reference to the rite of Christian baptism, we shall 
find that the meaning of the word ^anri'QcD more clearly and 

^ See p. 143. 



A. PRINCIPLE OF INTERPKETATIOIS". 145 

Tiniformly involves immersion in Greek, according to Lid- 
dell and Scott's Lexicon, the latest and most approved 
standard, than " dip" does in English, according to Webster. 

If the Sacred Scriptures had been originally Aviitten in 
Enghsh, and the word '' dip^^ had been placed by the pen 
of inspiration, where we now read " 'baptize^'' few we sup- 
pose would esteem the meaning at all doubtful, even though 
it could be proved that the word was somethnes used dif- 
ferently from its primary signification. 

There has been much error on this point. The real ques- 
tion to be settled is not whether, throughout the whole 
range of Greek literature, any cases do or do not occur, in 
which the term /?«7tt/^cj is used in any other sense than 
" iminerse^'^ as one would suppose from the arguments of 
most of our Pedobaptist brethren. They generally content 
themselves with attempting to prove that ^oiTtiiQco may 
sometimes be used in another sense, freely concedhig, as all 
who know any thing of the language must, that the primary 
and co^nmon usage of the term is precisely what Baptists 
contend. This is the first and most important point of 
issue now remaining between Baptists and Pedobaptists, 
not whether the word ^(xjtjI'qo) always involves immersion, 
but whether the command to baptize is always a command 
to immerse. The question is as to a law of interpretation. 

Almost every word has several significations, but the in- 
terpreter of Scripture has not therefore a right to attach 
any of the senses he pleases, much less all of them, but he 
is to take that one meaning, in each case, which common 
usage and the connection show to have been in the mind 
of the writer, and that is the sense of eycry command of 
Scripture, to the exclusion of all the other possible meaiXr 
lings, as completely as though they never existed. 

7 



146 PEIJSrCIPLE OF INTERPRETATION". 

In Ernesti's Principles of Interpretation, as translated and 
enlarged by Professor Stuart, it is laid down " tliat the 
sense of a word can not he diverse or imdtifarious at the 
same time^ and in the same passage or expression, 

" All men, in their daily conversation and ^viitings, attach 
but one sense to a word at the same tune and in the same 
passage, unless they design to speak in enigmas. Of course 
it would be m opposition to the universal custom of lan- 
guage if more than one meaning should be attached to any 
word of Scripture in such a case. Yet many have often 
done this, 

" Although a word can have but one meaning at the same 
tune and ui the same j)lace, usage has gradually assigned 
many meanings to the same word. The question, then, for 
an mterpreter, is simply this : Which one of the significa- 
tions that a word has, is connected with its use in any par- 
ticular instance," ^ 

It might be admitted, therefore, for the sake of argument, 
that many other senses may belong to the word ^ami'Qoj^ but 
the question then would be, which 07ie of these significa- 
tions is that which our Saviour intended in this particular 
command ? 

It is just at this pomt that a distinguished Pedobaptist, 
whom the writer of these pages will ever feel bound to re, 
vere and esteem, appears to him to have fallen into an \mr* 
portant mistake. Defining the question at issue, Professoi 
Pond says,^ " Whatever Baptists ofier to show that immer- 
sion is a valid mode, or the most proper mode, or that it 
was frequently practiced in ancient times, has no direct bear^ 
ing on the controversy, and no tendency to brmg it to aj 
close. Let them prove what we deny, that immersion ii^ 

^ Part i. chap. 1, sees. 11, 18. * Treatise on Baptism, p 14, 



1 



DR. pond's mistake. 14? 

essential to baptism — so essential that there can he no hap- 
tism without it^ and our differences on the subject are at an 
end." This conies just after representing the Baptists as 
asserting that " the meaning of the word [parulQix)^ is al- 
ways the same, and it always signifies to dip. It never has 
any other meaning." Now it is true that most Baptists 
hold what he here represents, in regard to the meaning of 
the original word for baptize. But it is obvious that he has 
confounded two things that might differ greatly, ^. e., what 
is essential to Christian haptism^ and what is always essen- 
tial to the meaning of the Greek word ^anxlX^M, Hence he 
has misconceived the point at issue in such a way as to 
give himself great advantage. The question just now cer- 
tainly is not whether immersion is "so essential to the mean- 
ing of the word ^anTl'Qco that there can be no baptism with- 
out it" but whether the sense of the command is such that 
immersion is enjoined in Christian baptism. The first is a 
speculative question of Greek philology — a comparatively 
nice and minute question — one upon which ninety-nine out 
of a hundred Christians can form but little positive opin- 
ion ; but the other belongs to the common sense meaning 
of a plain command intended to be easily understood and 
clear to the masses of Christians, one that would always be 
thus clear but for the learned dust that has been thrown 
around it. 

Our blessed Saviour gave his disciples instructions to 
" baptize'''^ a certain class of persons. The word, we will 
suppose, may have fiYQ or six different senses, as most words 
have, and as Webster considers " dip" to have. But we 
want just now to find that 07ie sense which ^anriQa) has in 
this command. To ascertahi this, the first resort is obviously 
to common usage ; and, unless something in the preposi- 



148 COMMON USAGE OF WORDS. 

tions, idiom, connection, or circumstances decide otherwise, 
this and this alone is the meaning of the command. 

In Professor Stuart's Ernesti the question is asked, " If 
the same word has many significations, how can the mean- 
ing in each case be found ? 1 . From the general man- 
ner of speaking, ^. e., from common usage, 2. From the 
proximate words or context. That is, tJie usual and oh- 
vioiis meaning is attached to the loord^ or else one which 
the context renders necessary. In addition to the aid 
drawn from these sources, an interpreter may sometimes 
obtain assistance from the scope or design of the writer, or 
from history, antiquities, or the nature of the subject."^ 

If a house is " to let," and a foreigner declares the mean- 
ing of the advertisement not clear, because Webster's 
Dictionary tells him that " let" sometimes means to " hin- 
der^^'> Avill it not relieve his difficulty to adhere to the only 
common sense rule of construing words, i, 6., according to 
ordinary usage, until proof of another is shown. 

Whatever else may be questioned, no competent person 
will now deny that the j)rimary and prevaiHng meaning of 
this term in ordinary usage was precisely equivalent to our 
English words to " dip," or to " immerse." If ever it had 
any other senses, they were either merely figurative, or 
very secondary to this the ordinary usage, and they almost 
always involve in some way the primary idea. 

More than fifty years ago. Professor Campbell, in his 
"Notes on Matthew iii. 11," had conceded in the fullest 
manner that the ordmary sense of ^ocutII^co was so obviously 
immerse, that he said he should have j^referred to adopt it 
instead of baptize throughout the New Testament but for 
the fact that the other term had been so long in use. 
' Part i, chap. I sec. 19. 



LEXICONS. 149 

Since that time the most important Peclobaptist authorities 
on this pomt are such lexicons as those of Robmson, or 
Liddell and Scott, and such a dissertation as that of Profes- 
sor Stuart. 

As to the primary meaning of ^ocml'Qa) there is no question. 
Professor Stuart even says: "The original etymological 
root of ^'xrni'QM^ ^(xnTto^ as also the nouns and adjectives kin- 
dred with them, appears plainly to be the monosyllable 
Bjtn, The leading and original meaning of the monosyl- 
lable seems to have been dipping^ plunging^ iminerging^ 
soahing^ or drenching in some liquid substance." ^ 

The common regular usage of this verb in classic Greek 
is fully proved by all these authorities. 

Rohiyison gives under this head " to dip in, sink, immerse, 
to dip in a vessel, to draw water." 

Liddell and Scott give the following meanings in the first 
edition of their Lexicon : " To dip repeatedly, dip under, 
7)iid. bathe, hence to steep, to wet, to pour upon, drench, to 
dip a vessel, draw water, to baptize." In the next edition, 
" to steep^ to wet^ to pouritpon^ to drencli^^'^ are all expunged.'^ 

Professor Stuart, indeed, has accurately and at length 
gone over the whole ground, and considered all the mean- 
ings of ^ccmiQu) in classic Greek, and at the conclusion he 
admits that there is no proof in it all that the word is ever 
used in any other than one of the two following senses : 

"1. To dip, plunge, immerse any thing in liquid. 

" 2. To overwhelm literally or figuratively."^ 

1 Biblical Repos. April, 1833, p. 288. 2 See p. 179. 

3 The only possible exception to this, in Professor Stuart's view, is the 
following passage brought forward as " not altogether certain," but prob- 
ably meaning " to lathe, by the application of liquid to tlio surface." 
Dionysius, of Ilehcarnasus, is commenting upon Homer, II. xii. 333, 



150 TREDOMINANT USAGE. 

In other words, the general classic usage of this term is, if 
possible, more clear, unambiguous, and uniform in its mean- 
ing than our English word to '' d'qy.'^'* 

Xor do any exce2)tional cases, Avliich he supposes to exist 
in the New Testament, affect the above conclusion, so far 
as the prevailing and current sense of the Avord among the 
Jews in our Saviour's time is concerned. In the Septuagint 
version of the Old Testament, Professor Stuart concedes 
immersion to be the predominant meaning. So also in the 
Apocry2)ha. In Josephus and l^hilo the uniformity of this 
usage is unquestioned.^ Hence Professor Stuart, winding 
1113 his remarks on the wliole use of the word, classic and 
Hellenistic, or sacred, and asking the question, " What is the 
proper force and signiiication of the word according to the 
general use of language ?" concedes fully that " A review 
of the preceding examples must lead any person to the 
conclusion that the predominant usage of the words ^anTto 
and f^uml^oj is to designate the idea of dippuig, plunging, 
and overwhehning."^ 

This concession as to the customary signification of the 
word, throws the burden of proving an exception in tlie 

where it is said of Ajax that he struck Cleobulus across the neck with 
his heavy sword, " and the ivliole sword became luarmed with blood." On 
this text Dionysius remarks that here *' Ilomcr exhibits very great em- 
phasis, as much as to say, the sword was so batlied {iSaTrTtodtvrog) with 
blood as to become heated." But this should be rendered cas Professor 
Stuart allows it miglit, " the sword was so dipj^ed, or immersed in blood, 
as to become heated." 

' Thus when the former is speaking of the death of Aristobulus, drowned 
by order of Herod, he says: " The boy was sent by night to Jericho, but 
there being, according to command, plunged (iSaTrri^o/ntvoi;) in a diving- 
bath by the Gauls, ho died." (Wars of the Jews 1, 11.) 

2 Bib. Repos., April, 1833, p. 313. 



MEANING OF ETERNAL. 151 

case of a command like this, upon those who claim it. It 
fixes the meaning of immersion upon the injunction, unless 
some other sense is shown to be more obvious in this 
case. 

In an important command like this of baptism given by 
Divine inspiration, we must presume that the term used is 
unequivocal m itsdf^ as the Baptists contend, unless the 
connection renders some other meaning instantly clear ; for 
it is a settled law of all correct language, that " equivocal 
terms ought ever to be avoided, unless where their connec- 
tion with the other words of the sentence instantly ascertain 
the meaning." ^ 

The whole certainty of language rests upon this principle. 
We build upon it the most important and certain of our 
conclusions. All our assurance from Scripture, even of 
eternal happiness for the righteous, rests upon it, as well as 
of the eternal punishment of the wicked. When, for in- 
stance, in arguing with a XJniversalist, we set before him 
the terms " eternal" and " everlasting," or rather the orig- 
inal (xlihviog^ he will, of course, plead that there are instances, 
like Ecclus., xlv. 15, and that the term does not mean fully 
and fairly without any end. And have we to go through 
the whole range of Greek literature, and give up the eter- 
nity of the blessedness of heaven if there shall be one or 
two cases found in which, figuratively or literally, the word 
may possibly have reference to a less duration ? Surely it 
is sufficient if we establish a prevailing usage. We are then 
entitled to claim that as the sense of the promise or the 
threatening of Scripture, unless those wlio think otherwise 
can produce proof of a different meaning in this case. The 
burden of shoAving an exception is tin-own on them. 
I CampboU's Rhetoric, book ii. cliap. G, sec. 2, part 1. 



152 PEEPOSITIOXS. 

So the command to baptize is here plainly a command to 
immerse, miless some special exceptional meaning can he 
clearly proved from the comiection or circumstances to a}> 
ply in this case. It is not enough to show that the word 
may mean this or that in other cases, but that it must mean 
something else here. Until that be done, the most usual 
and obvious sense of the Vv'ord is the comma/id. We have 
no right, by om- constructions, to put ambiguities into the 
Divine laws. 



g n. The Force of the Prepositioxs. 






In illustrating the command to baptize, near the com- 
mencement of the former section, the use of any preposition 
that would determine the nature of the command was care- 
fiilly avoided, so that it might rest upon the usual meaning 
of the verb alone. But if in the case we supposed, the cap- 
tain had dii'ected the sailor to " dij^ the bucket i?i, or i?itOj 
the sea," the case would, of course, be, if possible, still plainer. 
Or if, in addition to being told to " dip the bucket over- 
board," it were in evidence that the captain himself had 
just previously performed the same ceremony by way of 
examjDle to the men, and to the knowledge of this sailor, by 
dij^ping the bucket " m" or " ^;^^o" the water, could more 
be desired ? The concessions of Pedobaptists have made 
the case now, as we shall show, as clear as this would make 
it in the supposed illustration. A caviler might say that 
even our EngUsh preposition " ^n" is sometunes used where 
we only mean " on the surface," as Genesis, i. 22, " let fowl 
multiply m the earth." Chaucer thus speaks twice of 
" starving wi'ctchedly i?i a mountain." Less Hterally still, 
we speak of a man being " m wine," intending only that 



FOECE OF elg. 153 

the wine is in him. N"or is " into''^ more absokitely decisive.^ 
But we rightly argue that where, as in Mark, i. 9, or Mat- 
thew, iii. 6, the obvious sense of the preposition confirms the 
obvious sense of the verb, it fo7^ms a co?istruction as direct 
and decisive as language can make it. 

It has been commonly asserted by our Pedobaptist 
brethren that the prepositions used in connection with the 
descriptions of baptism could not assist in determining the 
sense of the command, or the method in which the rite was 
administered, and might mean either that baptism Avas to 
be with or ^?^ water as we pleased to understand them. 
This is a great mistake. 

We first consider Professor Stuart's own proposed rule 
for showing immersion to be the sense of the term ^anil^co 
in the clearest possible manner by the use of the preposi- 
tions in connection with it. 

" The Greek classic writers are accustomed, when they 
designate the idea of ^:)^w?^^^/^^, di2opin{/j imniersmg^ etc,^ 
INTO any thing, to put the name of that thing in the accu- 
sative case after (^(iixw or ^(xmltoj^ and to 2^ut hefore this case 
the preposition elg^ or some equivalent oneP'^ 

In the account of the baptism of Jesus Christ, by John, 
Mark, i. 9, we have precisely this very form of construction, 
rendered as follows in our English version : " Jesus came 
and was baptized of John in Jordan," (fi^g lov ^Ioqb6Lvr]v^, 
The primary and most natural idea of ^l<; indicates motion 
into as Passow, Robinson and all lexicons agree. As such 

^ See John, vi. 15, and Rev. viii. 5. Of course the English preiDOsitions 
*' in" and "into" are used more specificall}'' as a whole than the Greek 
kv and elq ; but m tlie const rucHons above, the sense of them is not nioro 
clear and defniite. 

2 Bib. Kupos. April, 1833, p. 313. 



154 MAEK, I. 9. 

it is opposed to £>f.^ That it may mean at^ in other cases, 
is not questioned, because all the jDrepositions are thus in- 
definite, except by the connection. They ar.e so in a degree 
even m Enghsh. But here the sense is as clear as Greek 
words can make it. The concurrence of translators is strong 
but the following cases from Professor Stuart are highly hn- 
portant concessions. Quoting an exactly similar use of the 
preposition bi^ and accusative after the verb here used, he 
says, '''E^umiae ei; top noiaixov^ can not usually mean less 
than that the indimdual of ichom this is affirmed^ did 
actually dive into the loater^ or teas in some way submerged 
into it. "^^"^ Xot a single exce2)tion to this usage has been 
pohited out by Professor Stuart in the whole range of Greek 
hterature, nor, we may venture to add, can it be fomid. 
Quoting a passage before referred to, from Dionysius of 
Hahcarnassus m which he uses the ^unilt,o) followed by the 
dative vvithout any preposition, and which Gale renders "di2> 
ped in blood ;" Professor Stuart admits that it is capable of 
being so rendered, but thmks that this meaning would have 
been more certaiu if, instead of the dative, he had used elg 
followed by the accusative.' Just thus we have it, Mark, i. 
9. So that there is, in regard to our Saviour's baptism, pre- 
cisely that form of expression which Professor Stuart would 
himself imagine and suggest as the most unequivocal possi- 
ble to make it certain that Jesus was baptized not at the 
river merely, or icith its water, but was plunged in or iiito 
the Jordan. He can conceive of no combination of terms 
in the Greek language that would make it more certain. 
Here at least the preiDOsition adds every confirmation and 
clearness that a jDreposition can to the siguification of the 
verb itself, so that the real question is, whether the Greek 
1 See Liddell and Scott, Art. 'Ei^. - Page 317. s Page 305. 



LUKE, III. 21. 155 

language can unequivocally express tliat a person was clip- 
ped in water. Robinson, in his Lexicon, gives this passage, 
Mark, i. 9, as a clear case of being baptized or jDlunged 
" into the Jordon," and Bloomfield ^ (who seems to think it 
possible that the eunuch having descended into the water 
might then only have had water poured copiously on his head) 
gives up the sense of this passage as decisive in favor of a com- 
plete immerdon of the Saviour in the river. " The sense," 
he says, " is, ' was dipped or plunged into^ ♦ ♦ ♦ qp \^ may 
here be ' He underwent the rite of baptism by being plunged 
into the water.' " Matthew's accoiipt corroborates this idea. 
It is then as clear ^ from Mark, i. 9, as it is in the j^oioer of 
Greek words to make it^ that Jesus was baptized by being 
immersed in Jordan. The verb, the preposition, and the 
circumstances all concur in rendering this the only opinion. 
And this alone, in the absence of other evidence would be 
sufticient to fix the meaning of the command by an illustra- 
tion. 

And further, this being established, the absence of any 
preposition in Luke's^ account goes to show that he con- 
sidered immersion here as sufficiently indicated by the verb 
^ami'Qo) itself; and that there was nothing but what was cus- 
tomary in this case so far as the method of baptism was 
concerned. 

If, then, we had not a single other case of baptism in the 
New Testament to illustrate the sense to be attached to the 
command, this one, showing the manner in which he who 
gave it had submitted to the rite himself, would be as perfect 
and authoritative an exposition as could be conceived, suffi- 
cient to clear a hundred elliptical expressions in which it 
might not liave been thought necessary to add any prepo- 
^ Notes on Matt., iii. 16. 2 Chap. iii. 21. 



156 



FORCE OF iv. 



sition. This is one of tlie most important results to a can- 
did mind of going over Professor Stuarts' examination of 
these prej^ositions. 

But is there any thing in the particles elsewhere to con- 
tradict this sense, or prevent it being attaclied to tlie com- 
mand ? Do we, for instance, find any such preposition as 
we might expect somewhere to meet with, if pouring water 
upo7i a person or sprinkling him ivith it, had been the mode 
adopted, but such as would not be used if immersion m 
water were intended ? More than fifty years ago it was re- 
marked by one of the njost judicious critics, that there is 
not one such case in the ISTew Testament. We never, for 
instance, find ^ni or ano thus immediately in connection with 
baptize, " which (as Campbell remarks) we doubtless should 
if sprinkling had been intended."^ On the contrary, in 
Mark i. 5, and Matt. iii. G, we liave a form of construction 
in which tlie use of the preposition bp [^^^] is, clearly in 
the opinion of this very high authority, not less decisive. 
Here we read of John, that " there went out unto him Je- 
rusalem and all Judea * =5- * and were baptized of liini 
in Jot dan P (tr t(5 'lo^davrij. 

It is true Professor Stuart contends that "in all these 
cases the manner of the action is no further designed than 
the word ^omrrQw implies it."^ But here it is that the de- 
velopment of those settled rules and laws of language and 
of interpretation to which the last hundred years has con- 
tributed so much, become invaluable. 

If Professor Stuart's vicAV of the case were correct, it 
would simply follow that the common usage of the verb 
would still be decisive of tlie command, there being noth- 
ing to cause a deviation. Or the clear passages would de- 
' Note on Matthew, iii. 11. 2 Page 319. 



1 



MARK, I. 5. MATTHEW, III. 6. 157 

cide those supposed to be doubtful. Certainly tlie doubtful 
could not shake the clear. " If one passage is accurately 
expressed so as to admit of no doubt it can not admit of any 
accommodation. The doubtful one must he accommodated 
to the plainP^ It has just been estabhshed that John im- 
mersed Jesus in the Jordan, and that this was regarded by 
Luke as sufficiently indicated by the verb ^anircoj alone, 
without any preposition. And we are now told that there 
were multitudes of others who received the same rite from 
the same administrator. Since the common, regular, and 
established meaning of the verb is to immerse, that is the 
sense we are bound to affix to it in the absence of opposite 
proof If the signification is made clear in Mark, i. 9, we 
have no right to consider it ambiguous in verse 5. A nar- 
rative or a command is often expressed less specifically in 
proportion as it is supposed to be well understood. " There 
are in all languages," as Dr. Campbell says, " certain ellipti- 
cal expressions which use has established, and Avhich there- 
fore very rarely occasion darkness. When they do occa- 
sion it they ought always to be avoided." If, then, the 
evangelists have not avoided elliptical expressions in regard 
to this rite, in any case, we are bound to conclude it Avas 
because there was nothing to render ambiguous the sense 
of the verb. 

But the prepositions are, in fact, quite decisive in confirm- 
ing the regular meaning of the verb in all cases, as Camp- 
bell has shown and as will be seen more fully at Appendix 
C. Here it is sufficient to remark that, according to tlie 
last edition of Professor Robinson's lexicon of tlie New 
Testament, in every case where am/ pre])osition is used by 
the sacred writers in t1iis rehition to (iaml'c^u)^ and the ele- 
^ Stuart's Eriiesti, § 186. 



158 DR. CAMPBELL. 

ment of the baptismal rite, it always indicates the manner^ 
and that manner to be immersion as plamly as our English 
word "m" can express this. Thus, according to him, it 
should be translated. 

Even Professor Robmson's evident desire in the three 
cases of St. Luke (considered in Appendix C), in which 
there is no preposition, to leave the sense of the verb am- 
biguous, only makes his views of the force of the preposi- 
tions more marked and decisive, and shows that the latest 
Pedobaptist authority directly contradicts Professor Stuart's 
estimate of the force of the prepositions here. Dr. Campbell 
goes further, and comments with great severity on those who 
in these cases do not translate the preposition so as to give 
the most unequivocal support to the idea of immersion. 
In his note on Matt. iii. 11, he says, that so 'idnconsistent" 
are King James' translators m having rendered the clause 
1 1 vduTL "-toith water" that "none of them have scrupled to 
render 'ev tcD ^lo^ddpri in the sixth verse ' m Jordan,' though 
nothing can be plainer than that, if there be any incongru- 
ity in the expression ' in water,' this ' in Jordan' must be 
equally incongruous. But they have seen that the prepo- 
sition 171 could not be avoided there without adopting a 
circumlocution and sa^dng 'with the water of Jordan,' 
which would have made their deviation from the text too 
glaring." " It is to be regretted," he adds, " that we have 
so much evidence that even good and learned men allow 
their judgments to be warped by the sentiments and cus- 
toms of the sect which they prefer. The true partisan, of 
whatever denomination, always inclines to correct the dic- 
tion of the Spirit by that of the party." 

The above is a fair review of the Ught thrown upon this 
question during the last century by the discussions m regard 



i 



POOLS IN JERUSALEM. 159 

to the force of the prepositions used in connection \vith bap- 
tism. In a word, they are not such particles as "doubt- 
less would have been used" as Campbell well says, had 
^utitI^co meant in these cases to " sprinkle" or to " pour." 
But they are such as show it to be the duty of the trans- 
lator in all cases to make his construction as indicative of 
immersion as our English word '' m" can make it. 

§ III. Circumstances attending Baptism. 

It has often been urged that it was impossible for water 
to have been found in the city of Jerusalem for the bap- 
tism of the three thousand on the day of Pentecost, no 
river being near at hand. A hundred years ago, when 
sacred geography was but little understood, few persons 
could definit^y meet such assertions, and they have become 
so common, handy, and habitual, that to this day the same 
thing is often urged as an objection even by the most re- 
spectable writers. But within the last thirty years the 
sacred city has been so measured and explored by survey- 
ors of the highest authority, that a point like this can be 
settled now on data that can not be shaken. The re- 
searches of Dr. Robinson and others, in Palestine, have 
established the most ample conveniences. It will be 
sufficient simply to enumerate five or six of the princi- 
pal public pools, the dimensions of which are or were 
as follows. The figures are in most cases those of Dr. 
Robinson. 

1. There was the Pool of Bethesda^ where the impotent 
man lay. It had every convenience and suitability for this 
rite, tliree hundred and sixty feet long, one Inmdrcd and 
thirty feet broad, seventy-five feet deep in parts, but so ar- 



160 AYATEE FOR BAPTIZING. 

ranged round the sides as to afford facilities for tlie bap- 
tism of multitudes. 

2. The King''s^ or Solomon'^ s Pool^ supplied from " the 
Fountain of the Virgin," according to Dr. Robinson, is fif- 
teen feet long, six feet broad, three feet deep in parts, and 
capable of being raised for bathmg purposes by a slight 
dam used to this day. It was supplied ^^ith a constant 
stream of fresh water, and exactly fit for immersing any 
number. 

3. The Pool of Siloam^ fifty-three feet long, eighteen feet 
broad, nineteen feet deep in parts, with another smaller 
pool close by, both commonly used for bathing purposes as 
Dr. Robinson remarks. 

4. The Old Pool^ or Upper Pool in the highway of the 
Fuller'^s Fields according to Dr. Robinson, three hundred 
and sixteen feet long, two hundred and eighteeti feet broad, 
eighteen feet deep in parts, covering more than an acre 
and a half, " mth steps at the corners, by which to de- 
scend into it." 

5. The Pool of Hezehiah^ according to Dr. Robinson, 
two hundred and forty feet long, one hundred and forty- 
four feet broad, covering thus more than an acre of ground, 
with a descent of steps at the north-west angle, and a 
sloping bottom m otJier places. 

6. The Loioer Pool of Gihon^ according to Dr. Robinson, 
five hundred and ninety-two feet long, two hundred and 
sixty feet broad, forty-two feet deep in parts. It covers more 
than four acres of ground, is rather a 23ond than a pool in 
j)omt of size, its sides havmg a slope just adapted to a de- 
scent for immersion. In this spot alone, three thousand or 
any number might have been baptized the same day. There 
are many other cisterns and pools in which unmersion could 



TIME OCCUPIED. 161 

have been performed. In all of these places the sides are 
more or less sloping, so that miless at the time of some 
freshet they would have been suitable for bathing.^ 

The time it would have occupied to have unmersed the 
three thousand, used commonly to be brought forward as 
an objection to the ordinary signification oi ^aml'Qo) in Acts, 
ii. 41. Now it is seldom adduced, probably, because so 
little if any time would have been saved by adopting any 
other method. 

It is worthy of remark that this difficulty never has 
troubled those who would best know it, if it were real. 
There is something painfully httle in having to discuss 
questions of time about a matter of this solemn mterest ; 
it is an ordinance that is usually prolonged, from its pleas- 
ing nature. And yet it may be proper to show that if time 
were an object, little, if any thing, would necessarily be 
gained by sprinklmg in place of immersion, where a large 
number had to be baptized. What antiquary ever denied 
the immersion of the ten thousand, baptized in one day in 
the river Swale, near the beginnmg of the seventh century, 
on account of supposed difficulties of this kind ? Or who 
ever ventured to question that the baptism of the three 
thousand on Easter eve, a.d. 404, at Constantmople, dis- 
turbed by the officers sent to arrest Chrysostom, was by 
immersion ? And yet with all the complicated mysteries 
then introduced, this must have been more difficult to ac- 
complish in one night than that of the three thousand in 
one day by the administrators of those times. 

A few years ago a minister had occasion to baptize 
twenty-seven persons in a stream of water. The plan 

^ For a full description of the above, see Baptismal Tracts, 115, 30, by 
Dr. Chase and Rev. G-. W. Sampson. 



162 THE QUESTION OF TIME. 

adopted, was one wliich had been customary in that place 
for one or two generations. The administrator having pro- 
ceeded a convenient distance into the stream with an assist- 
ant acquainted \dih the ground, the candidates properly 
attu'ed followed in jDrocession, not behind exactly, but a ht- 
tle to the right hand of the minister. As each was bap- 
tized he passed on a Uttle to the left, and another was ready 
to step forward immediately, and another, and another, 
while those baptized walked in procession to the shore. In 
this way the iDrincipal time really was occupied by the ad- 
ministrator in repeating the baptismal formula, for that 
taken up by the immersion was scarcely a second, and 
would not make the service much, if any longer than by 
pourmg. It was a solemn season and one over which 
neither the administrator nor the candidates had the least 
disposition to hurry, nor will that semi-circular procession 
ever fade from the mmds of those who witnessed it. A 
short time afterward, one of the deacons, a gentleman most 
careful and exact in all he said and did,^ informed the writer 
that he had marked the time occupied in administering 
baptism to the whole twenty-seven candidates, which was 
just eight oninutes. In this way which is as solemn as any 
in which the ordinance could be performed, especially where 
there is a large number of candidates, the whole of the 
three thousand might have been baptized by twelve admin- 
istrators in less than 07ie hour and a quarter. 

But a better knowledge of early ecclesiastical customs 
than was customary a hundred years ago has reduced this 
objection to a perfect absurdity. Then the masses of Chris- 

^ The late Oliver Stevens, Esq., of Savannah, father of the esteemed 
missionary of that name in Burmah, for so many years the companion 
in labor of Juclson. 



THE JAILOR. 163 

tians probably believed that under no circumstances could 
a baptism be valid unless performed by a minister, regu- 
larly ordained, and bringing do^vn a title to administer it 
in succession from the Apostles, who, it was therefore 
granted, could alone have been the dispensers of the ordi- 
nances in this case. But now it is well known to all, that 
in the earliest times the administration of baj^tism was not 
confined to ministers, and that the Apostles generally pre- 
ferred not to baj^tize with their own hands. 

It is probable that the seventy at least were even more 
engaged in baptizing than the twelve, accordmg to apostolic 
custom.^ These two bodies alone would give eighty-two 
administrators. If we should suppose a hundred present, 
who might be employed in case of any difiiculty as to time, 
and even a minute occupied in the baptism of each (which 
is more than double what was necessary where there were 
several candidates), the whole might have been adminis- 
tered in thirty minutes. Makmg all allowance for changes 
of dress, there is no difficulty as to time.^ 

Such are the two only difiiculties, from attendant circum- 
stances in the way of considering the rite of baptism al- 
ways to have required immersion, unless perhaps some 
should suppose that of the jailor and his household to de- 
mand elucidation. But m those Eastern countries where 
baths are so usual, what is there remarkable in this case ? 

^ See Acts, xi. 48, and 1 Cor. i. 14. 

2 It is surprising that it never occurred to those who make this ob- 
jection to immersion, how much more strongly it would bear against in- 
fant baptism, which, if administered, as a matter of course, according to 
their supposition, and only on this account not recorded, must have re- 
quired them to bring forward tlieir children also, doubling the number to 
be baptized, and far more than doubling the time required for its admin- 
istration. 



164 PHILIPPI. 

Judson observed the commonness of baths in jail premises 
even in India. 

However, the labors of modern Pedobaptists may assist 
us here a little. It was m a city (Philippi) on " the Place 
of Fountains," " so called from its nmnerous streams ^'^'^ 
scoojDcd out no doubt into many reservous, on account 
of the gold and silver mines which first brought its early 
inhabitants together. Here flowed the River Gangas, by 
which must have stood the house of prayer where Lydia's 
heart was opened. But w^as there water in the prison suffi- 
cient for baptism ? it is demanded. Probably not, for as 
Connybeare has shown, it is distinctly intimated that the 
jailor took them out of the prison itself to some fountain 
or convenient place for ablution, probably connected ivith 
the prison, where he washed their stripes, and was baptized 
before he again removed them mto his oa^^i house.^ 

Xow this is every thing which used to be supposed ad- 
verse to the idea of immersion connected with the rite of 
baptism m the Xew Testament ; and it all exhibits not the 
shghtest occasion to imagine any deviation intended fi-ona 
the ordinary signification of the word, when used in the 
command. 

But this is not all. There are many facts mentioned that 
have been sujDposed to imply immersion. To begin with 
the baptism of John. It is particularly mentioned that he 
went to the Jordan to baptize, and that Jesus came to that 
river to receive the ordinance. Apart from the force of 

^ Ilapa?ial3dv, in verse 33, intimates a change of place. Prof. Stuart 
fails of his usual accuracy, therefore, in supposing the water for the wash- 
ing of their stripes and baptism to have been brought into the prison. 
See Connybeare and Howson's Life of St. Paul, vol. i. pp. 311, 331. Lon- 
don quarto edition. 



MUCH WATER. 165 

the prepositions, why is he represented as "coming up 
(d/To) out of, or even from the water .^" And why is it so 
carefully specified^ that it was ''^'because there was much 
water there^^'' that John selected Enon as a place for bap- 
tism, and that the people came there and were baptized ? 
It has been said that it may mean simply that there were 
" many streams^'' there. Suppose it so ; what then ? Why 
the people m^ay have brought their flocks with them, and 
have needed convenient streams for these. But why then 
should the water be more carefully specified than the grass? 
For, what we want to know is, why the " much water" or 
" many waters" is so particularly mentioned, just hetioeen 
the two announcements of baptism. It must have been for 
the reason given by Bloomfield, ^. e., that " it is plain, from 
various passages of the Gospels, that baptism was adminis- 
tered by the baptizer after having placed the person to he 
baptized in some river or hrooJc, And that plenty of water 
was thought desirable, we learn from John, iii. 23."^ The 
phrase vdaia nolla is SO used in all other places as almost ne- 
cessarily to imply a large body or bodies of water, rather than 
many little streams.^ Campbell adheres to the English 
translation. It is straining to question that the allusion here 
is clearly to immersion and nothing else.^ 

The case of the eunuch is generally considered as an 
illustration of immersion.^ " See here is water." Why 
this for aspersion ? Why this remark, and if made, Avhy is 
.it recorded? And again, why do they both go down into 

* John, iii. 23. ^ See Bloomfield's Notes on Acts, viii. 38. 

^ See Ripley's Reply to Stuart, pp. 64-12; and Robinson's Calmet. 
Art. Gibeon. 

* But see Samson's letter, pp. 14G-152, in Chase's Design of Baptism. 

* Acts, viii. 38. 



166 1 COEINTHIANS, X. 2. 

(sig) the water, and come up out of (i^t) the water ? It is 
said the prepositions may mean that they went down only 
to the water, and came np/ro??2 it. Suppose it so. Why 
do they both go down to the water ? Why not send the 
charioteer ? or if they go, why so ]3 articular to record it, 
and the coming up out of, or from it ? But in fact there is j 
not the slightest reason to depart from the natural sense of | 
slg^ which clearly indicates here into^ as £3< out of to suit the 
verb and the noun. Bloomfield admits this, and that " the 
baptizer and the baptized" both went " into water of some 
depth," in this case, and customarily. For what then 
should both go into the water, in baptism, but immersion ? 
These circumstances, so naturally and specifically recorded, 
all make up an amount of corroboration that it is difficult 
to estimate and impossible to overcome, conceded and con- 
firmed as we find them now by the clearest results of mod- 
ern criticism. 

§ lY. The Figurative allusions to Baptism. 

Some have found in 1 Corinthians, x. 2, " were baptized 
unto Moses in the cloud, and in the sea," an allusion to 
the spray of the Red Sea S2jri7ikUng the Israelites. This 
Professor Stuart gives up.^ Baptists consider that the ref- 
erence is to their going down into the bed of the Red Sea, 
which stood as a wall on the right hand and on the left, 
until they came up again out of the deep, the cloud above 
them completmg the immersion. That this baptism was 
figurative, and not related as literal, is e\ddent. But all 
figures rest on a basis of fact. That the Iraelites were not 
literally immersed in the sea is plain. JBut that is far from 
^ Page 333, 



1 



THE AKK A FIGUKE. 167 

justifying Professor S.'s assertion, that it seems " of neces- 
sity to imply that immersion is not essential to the idea of 
lba23tism." For the " idea" is fomided on the literal fact. 
What literal fact, in regard to baptism, is the figm-e based 
on ? Professor Stuart replies thus : " I do not see how, on 
the whole, we can make less of it than to suppose that it has 
a tacit reference to the idea of surrounding in some way." 
And again : " It is therefore a kind of figurative mode of 
expression, derived from the idea that baptism is surround- 
ing with a fluid." ^ But how a person could be surrounded 
with water in baptism without being immersed, it must 
take some ingenuity to discover, especially if the idea he so 
often insists on, of overwhehning^ be added as embraced in 
the word baptize. 

In 1 Peter, iii. 20, 21, baptism is said to be the figure of 
our being placed in a state of salvation, like ISToah in the 
ark, who was thus kept alive in the midst of the waters. 
Here the same figure founded upon the water s%irrounding 
and iin^nersing the sides of the ark in which he was en- 
closed, is evident. From this idea, ISToah's ark became a 
favorite symbol of the Church with ancient Christians, so 
long as immersion w^s practiced, and is constantly found 
rudely sculptured in the cataconibs of Rome, to indicate 
that the tenant of the tomb within was a member of the 
Church, The publication of many mterestmg researches 
of modern ecclesiastics among the tombs of these ancient 
saints, illustrated by plates, has within the last few years 
thrown new interest around this passage. So far as it goes 
it must be favorable to the Baptist views of the question 
of immersion, especially as the Apostle, in guarding us 
^igainst the superstition of supposing its efiicacy derived 
* Page 336. 



168 TEEXCH ON HEBREWS X. 22. 

from " washing away tlie filth of the flesh," clearly implies 
that baptism was always a rite in which there was a thor- 
ough washmg of the whole body. 

Hebrews, x. 22, " ha^dng om- bodies washed mth pure 
water," Professor Stuart admits to be in no way inconsist- 
ent with immersion, as this is one way in which cleansing 
may be effected, but gathers from it that " loashing was at 
least one method, and perhaps even the more ordhiary one, 
of practicing baptism.^ But Islov/LtepoL should here be ren- 
dered " bathed iny Trench, m his masterly " Spion}mies 
of the Xew Testament," says,^ " lovsiv is not so much 'to 
wash' as ' to bathe,' and lovodai^ ' to bathe oneself,' implies 
always, not the bathing of a part of the body, but of the 
icJioIe — IslovuifOi i6 (Twwa, Heb. x. 23." Thus, baptism is 
here compared to a bath, and the accurate rendering of the 
passage would be, " having our bodies bathed in pure water." 

In Luke, xii. 50, the Saviour says, according to our trans- 
lators, " I have a baptism to be baptized with," etc. The 
use of the word loith m connection with bajotism, is preju- 
dicial, for it is a preposition we never use in connection with 
immersion, and there is nothing in the original to warrant 
its insertion. Campbell gives the true sense : " I have an 
unmersion to undergo," or as Professor Stuart says, " I am 
about to be overwhelmed with suffering." So m Mark x. 
38, " Can ye indeed take upon you to undergo patiently and 
submissively, sufferings hke mine — sufferings of an over- 
*oAe^mn^ nature ?" So m Matthew, iii. 11, which should 
read as Campbell translates it and defends, " He shall baj)- 
tize you in (Iv) the Holy Ghost and in fire.' 

^ Most would admit that whatever is here meant by " washed with 
pure water," is spoken of as pertaining to cdl the Christians of the 
Apostle's time. ^ Pages 216, IT. ^ SeehisXotes. 



ROMANS, yi. 4. 160 

There are two other figurative passages considered by 
the Baptists more decisive than any others as to the hght 
they throw on the manner in which the rite was universally 
at first understood to be commanded. The first of these is 
Romans, vi. 4, " We are buried with him by (dta) baptism 
into death, that like as Christ was raised from the dead by 
the glory of the Father, even so w^e also should walk in 
newness of life." To an unsophisticated English reader, the 
allusion here, it is urged, is plain. Baptism is made the 
figure of a bicrial^ and immersion is thereby indicated. Al- 
most every commentator of repute, ancient and modern, 
has adopted this view. Professor Stuart, even while un- 
dertakmg to show a difierent sense, confesses that " it is 
difiicult to procure a patient re-hearing, because it has been 
so long regarded by some as being out of /air dispute."^ 
[See Appendix D.] 

The whole weight of modern criticism is utterly agamst 

^ The apostolic constitutions say, "Baptism is given into the death of 
Jesus. The water is instead of the burial j * * * the descent into 
the water, the dying together with Christ, the ascent out of tlie water, 
the rising again with Him." Book iii. ch. 1*7. And so again at each 
baptism, the prayer was solemnly made, "Sanctify this water, so that he 
who is baptized, may die with Him, and may be buried with Him, and 
may rise with Him," while baptism is thus called in the same prayer, " an 
emblem of the death of Christ." (Chase's edition of the Constitutions and 
Canons, book vii. chap. 43. 

Chrysostom thus makes baptism an emblem and proof of the resurrec- 
tion (Hom. 40, in 1 Corinthians), and again "wo dip our heads in water 
as in a grave. Our old man is buried, and when we rise up again the new 
man rises therewith." (Horn. 25, in John iii. 5.) In fiicfc it would prob- 
ably be impossible to fnid a question as. to the doubt of these words 
to immersion, during the first l^fteen l^undred years of the ChristiaQ 
era. 

8 



170 FORCE OF ROMANS lY . 4. 

the new view, as Bloomfield has sho^vvn in his comment on 
Romans, vi. 4. " The rite of immersion," he says '^ m the 
baptismal water, and egress from it, were used as a symbol 
of breaking off all connection with the i^resent smful life, 
and giving one's self to a new and pure one." And he gives 
the sense of verse 4, as follows : " We have been thus buried 
in the tvaters of baptis7n. There is a plain allusion to the 
ancient custom of baptism by immersion." Connybeare 
declares of Romans, \d. 3, that ''this passage can not he 
zmderstood except by remembering that the primitive mode 
of baptism was by immersion." It is useless to multiply 
authorities. 

The real importance of these allusions, Rom. vi. 4, Col. 
ii. 12, is that they complete the proof that nothing else was 
known by the Apostle as Christian baptism. It has been 
commonly conceded by Pedobaptists, that all John's bap- 
tisms were by immersion, that Jesus was thus baptized, but 
then they have sometimes supposed that Christian baptism 
was variously administered. But St. Paul here obviously 
shows that all those to whom he was writing were as a 
matter of course, and an essential part of their baptism 
"buried" in the water. He says of himself and all the 
primitive Christians, " loe are buried with Christ by baptism." 
This figure shows how the command to be baptized was 
every where understood. Indeed the form of a question 
in verse 3 (which as Connybeare remarks can only be un- 
derstood by reference to immersion), reduces every other 
view to an absurdity. " Know ye not that so many of us 
as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his 
death ? therefore we are buried vvith him by baptism," etc. 

Thus the biblical criticism of the last hundred years has 
unfolded an amount of evidence from the figurative allusions 



HISTORICAL YIEW. l*?! 

to the ordinance of baptism in the ISiew Testament, which 
renders it certain that the nniversal understanding and 
and practice of all the earliest Christians in reference to the 
method of administering the rite of baptism, was exactly 
that of the Baptists. For according to the interpretation 
of Bloomiield, Connybeare, and others, the language of 
Romans, vi. 4, is not true of any persons but those im- 
mersed in baptism. They may be, and thousands are, 
spiritually dead with Christ. They may be spiritually 
risen with him. But they are not as all primitive Christians 
plainly were " buried with him bi/ baptism.'^'* 

§ y. Historical Yiew of Immeesion and SpRiNKLixa. 

Professor Stuart has devoted a section to the proj)er in- 
quiry, " What was the mode of baptism practiced by the 
churches m the early ages of Christianity, and after the 
times of the Apostles ?" While he gives it up as " a thing 
made out that the ancient practice was immersion," ^ yet 
he also thinks it " no doubt true that there were cases of 
exception allowed to persons in extreme sickness or old age." ^ 
This is substantially the Baptist view, with one important 
omission. Professor Stuart does not add how soon this 
exceptional practice begun. Baptists have claimed that 
there is not a single case of any baptism but immersion on 
record, before near the middle of the third century. In a 
chronological table cited by Coleman from Rheinwald, a.d. 
230, is given as the date of the lirst appearance of clinic 
baptism.^ 

In examining the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, Pro- 
fessor Stuart complains that " scarcely any thing of a defi- 
^ Page 359. ^ Ibid. ^ Christian Antiquities, p. 531. 



172 IIEKMAS. 

nite nature occurs respecting baptism." We can easily 
gather that baptism was practiced, he thinks, but are not able 
to determine with precision the manner of the rite. He refers 
us, however, to a passage in the '' Shepherd of Hermas," 
which he partly quotes. Taken as a whole, it is an import- 
ant passage here. The vision is uideed but the dream of 
some ignorant Christian, intended to describe his views of 
the building up of the Church. This is represented by the 
erection of a tower upon a rock, near by a place of deep 
water. The shepherd sees stones raised one by one out of 
the deep, and others afterward rise out of it themselves, 
and are carried by virgins and built up in the form of a 
tower. The shepherd asks the angels what these are that 
were raised up out of the deep water, and they are shown 
to be the Old Testament saints ; those who rose up of them- 
selves are the Apostles and saints of the New Testament. 
It is then asked how the Old Testament saints came to arise 
out of the water and enter into this tower, seeing that they 
were holy spirits long ago. The angel intimates tliat they 
were baptized in the world of spirits by the Apostles. " It 
was necessary for them to ascend by water ^ that they might 
be at rest," and that they being dead nevertheless, were 
thus sealed. " That seal," he proceeds, " is the water of 
baptism into lohich "tnen descend^ being under obligation to 
death (i, 6. in a state of condemnation), but come up ap- 
pointed unto life." The shepherd next asks why the IsTew 
Testament saints also ascend with them out of the deep, and 
is answered that the Apostles and teachers went and 
preached to those who were dead before, and gave them 
this seal. " They loent doion therefore into the water with 
them^ and again came %ipP 

The whole of this is one of the most absurd allegories 



JUSTI]^ MARTYR. 173 

handed down to us in early Church History. It shows how 
soon the doctrine of the necessity of baptism to salvation 
entered, and the folly of having to go out of the Bible for 
any part of our Christianity, since, at one of the very first 
steps, we meet with such superstition as this. However, 
the only question here is whether, when this was written, it 
is not evident that immersion alone was considered baptism, 
seeing that the writer plainly thought that even the Old 
Testament saints had to be immersed ! And this, though 
ordinarily ranked as a production of the first century, is 
tiow, on internal evidence, commonly placid in the second. 

Professor Stuart proceeds to say, that in the writings of 
Justin Martyr, " w^here we might naturally expect some- 
thing definite, nothing of this nature occurs." ^ He quotes 
the well-known passage from that writer, in which he says 
that those who become believers " are led by us to a place 
where there is water ^^"^ etc. Professor Stuart does not attach 
the same importance to the verb Aotiw that Trench would 
have done, where Justin says that there " they are bathed in 
the name of God the Father," etc. Yet he observes : " I 
am persuaded that this passage, as a whole, most naturally 
refers to immersion ; for why, on any other ground, is the 
convert, who is to be initiated, to go out to the place where 
there is water. There could be no need of this if mere 
sprinkling, or partial efiusion only, was customary in the 
time of Justin." Nor is there any thing contrary produced 
until long after Tertullian, when it ceases to be so impor- 
tant. 

Augusti, however, translated by Coleman, says : *' It is j^ 
great mistake to suppose that baptism by immersion was 
discontinued when mlant baptism became prevalent. Tliis 
^ Page 355, 



174 

was as early as the sixtli century, but the practice of immer- 
sion continued until the thirteenth or fourteenth century. 
Indeed, it has never been formally abandoned, but is still 
the mode of administermg mfant baptism in the Greek 
Church." ' 

" But enough," writes Professor Stuart. " It is, as says 
Augusti, a thing made oiit^ i 6., the ancient j)ractice of im- 
mersion. So, indeed, all writers who have thoroughly in- 
vestigated this subject conclude. I know of no one usage 
of ancient times which seems to me more clearly and cer- 
tainly made out. I can not see how it is possible for any 
candid man who examines the subject to deny this.* 



We have thus shown the progress of Baptist views, from 
the concessions of Pedobaptists, as to the rules of interpre- 
tation ; the usual meaning of ^aml'^M ; the force of the pre- 
positions used in connection with it ; as to the places where, 
and circumstances under which, both in Scripture and 
early Church History, the rite was performed ; and even as 
to the figurative allusions which are all demonstrative of 
the universahty of immersion in primitive baptism. 

^ Coleman's Christian Antiquities, chap. 14, sec. 8, p. 275 Since the 
first pubhcation of the above work, especially valuable as an excel- 
lent condensation and translation of important portions of the conclusions 
of Augusti, Rheinwald, and others, Mr. Coleman has been unfortunately 
tempted to recast his work, put in a arge amount of his own, and oblit- 
erate some valuable portions of the translations. By this his book is 
far from having gained in real value whatever may be the effect on its 
popularity. Among other results of this, he seems to express the con- 
clusioD that one of the earliest corruptions of the Church was the intro- \ 
duction of immersion instead of pouring, or sprinkling, which he sagely I 
conjectures must have taken place at a very early date I 2 Page 359. 



PROPER AND TROPICAL SENSES. 175 

Nothing more is necessary to determine most certainly 
that the command to baptize is a command to immerse, al- 
though the word ^aTcirc^cj should have a hundred other pos- 
sible meanings. JSTor does the correctness of Baptist views 
depend in the least upon the nicer philological question we 
are about to discuss in the next section. 



§ YI. BaiTTi^G) Always Involves Immersion. 

It will now be proper to show how far the discussions of 
the last hundred years have gone toward settling definitely 
that ^ajtxi'Qo) is never used in classical or Hellenistic Greek, 
except with a direct reference to its primary and common 
signification — to dip^ to immerse. 

All words are either proper terms or rhetorical tropes ; 
that is, they are used either literally or figuratively. When 
one of our poets, describing a sunset, says : 

'' Each flinty spire 
"Was lathed in floods of living fire,'* 

Or another says ; 

" A cold, shuddering dew 
Dips me all o'er," 

it occasions us no embarrassment. We understand the 
figurative language by first of all referring back in our minds 
to the literal meaning of the terms. And although the 
word " bathe" sometimes in English means only to saturate, 
or wet, copiously with and not in a fluid, yet in such a pass- 
age as that M^here it occurs above, we form our conception 
of the figure by conceiving first of all of an immersion. And 
we grasp the beauty of the figure only as we get a vivid 



176 DANIEL, lY. 30. 

conception of the literal meaning of the term as there nsed, 
distinct from all its other meanings. The figurative use of 
a word, then, must always, so long as it is figurative, bring 
before the mind some pre-existing and well-known proper 
sense of the term. Such a word as " dip" in English, always^ 
even when used figuratively, as above, of the dew, first of 
all gives us the idea of an immersion, which, transferred to 
the action of the dew, suggests the conception of a satura- 
tion as complete as if there had been a literal dipping in water. 

No mstance in the whole compass of Greek literature has 
been adduced of so figurative a use of |?«7it/Jw as this of the 
word " c?^}9." One case, however, has been produced from 
the Septuagint of a kindred term, ^umu)^ used in very much 
this way. It is Daniel, iv. 30, concerning Nebuchadnezzar, 
who, it is said, was driven forth from among men, and made 
to eat grass hke the ox, " and his body was [i^dccpi]) bathed 
in the dew of heaven." A single case like this does not 
molest the literal meaning of ^(i/rrw, but rather confirms it, 
implying as do all the figurative uses both of ^dnro) and 
^amitf*)^ the largest possible application of fluid that the 
nature of the case wiU admit. 

But it is unnecessary to pursue this further, as it is ad- 
mitted by all, that in the command to baptize the principal 
verb is not used figuratively, but in some proper sense, and 
the verb ^dniM is never used at all. 

Sometimes, it is true, that which was at first only tropical, 
becomes at length a literal meaning of a word, and it is 
often a nice point to say whether a term is used literally 
or figuratively. It is thus that meanings multiply. But 
this change is only brought about by the common and long- 
continued usage of a metaphor, so that it ceases to have any 
influence upon the imagmation of those to whom it is ad- 



LIDDELL AND SCOTT. 177 

dressed. Thus we never speak now of " edifying'' a house 
that we may be erecting, but even confine the proper sig- 
nification of the word to what must at first have been its 
metaphorical use, and talk only of edifymg an audience. 

In ascertaming the literal meaning of the term ^anrl^co^ 
all the figurative uses of it will not affect us then, unless 
the same figure can be shown to have become so hack- 
neyed, that it had ceased to throw back the imagination to 
another and literal sense, when alone it would become a 
proper meaning of the word itself. 

(a). Classic use of ^anjiQo), 

The following facts may be considered as no slight proof 
wrought out by a singular combination of circumstances, 
that m the whole compass of classic Greek and in the con- 
ception of the best critical authorities in the world, the 
term ^amfQco is 7iever once used without involving the idea 
of hnmersio7i, and that it has literally no pro^oer signifixa- 
tion that does not include that idea. 

In July, 1843, there was pubhshed with great care at 
the Oxford University Press, the now celebrated and stand- 
ard Greek Lexicon of Messrs. Liddell and Scott. It was 
founded on the great one of Passow, pubhshed in Germany, 
but embraced an amount of other investigations far beyond 
his. In fact, it may be almost said that there is not an im- 
portant sentence in the whole range of Greek literature 
that it has not weighed. 

At the commencement of this chapter, we gave its defi- 
nitions of ^anxi'Qji as they appeared in the first edition. 
Published by the clergymen of the Cluirch of England, 
their testimony in favor of ''pouring," "steeping," or 
" wetting," as sometimes proper meanings, might not have 



178 LEXICON COKRECTED. 

been absolutely conclusive with a Baptist, without better 
proofs than they attempted to produce, but would at least 
make it incumbent on him to weigh w^ell his case before 
venturing to dispute the authority of such a work. These 
definitions have been weighed, however, not by Baptists so 
much as by independent critics and by the authors of the 
Lexicon themselves — found wanting, and the senses thus 
attached to the word ahandoned and expunged as untena- 
ble within a year and a half of their first publication. 

The work itself was reviewed in the " London Quarterly," 
and considered justly, as not indeed without its faults, but 
very far before all other Greek Lexicons extant. " A great 
many" of the first scholars suggested " corrections," how- 
ever, which were made in the second edition. 

Li the mean time Professor Drisler was bringing out an 
edition of it in this country with his own " corrections and 
additions." Shortly after this was published, the Professor 
of ancient languages in the University of Louisiana, on 
comparing Professor Drisler's edition mth a copy of the 
second j)^^blished at Oxford, was surprised to find, that the 
literal senses of the term ^amll^x)^ not imj)lying immersion 
(unless "bathe" be an exception), which were in the Amer- 
ican, were not to he found in the London copy. Public 
attention being called to this fact, and the American editor 
having been blamed in some quarters for making so im- 
portant an interpolation without avowing it, he defended 
himself by showing that the meanings to " steep^'' " to wet^'^ 
" to pour itpon^"^ " to drench^'''' though quietly dashed out 
by Liddell and Scott from their second edition, were all ^n 
the first ; this suiDpression being a part of those " correc- 
tions" which the Lexicon had undergone through the sug- j 
gestions and co-operation of their many friends. Another 



EDITIOJN-S COMPARED. 



179 



edition of the American work being called for, it has been 
brought out by Professor Drisler. Among his own addi- 
tions and corrections he has not esteemed it fitting to add 
any thing to the second English edition in regard to this 
word, but followed it and loithdmwn all the senses which 
the Oxford editors had retracted. 

The effect of all this in deciding the meaning of the term 
^aniiQisi as a classic Greek word, is most important. If a 
single instance could have been produced from the re- 
searches of Passow, or of any preceding lexicographer, or 
from a most extensive examination of all the important 
passages of Greek literature bearing upon it, in the course 
of a learned controversy of two hundred years, these mean- 
ings never would have been retracted by men who are daily 
in the habit of sprinkling infants. Let any one place side 
by side the definitions of the two editions. 



FIRST EDITION. 

B(27rr/c;«, 1. To dip repeatedly^ dip 
under ^ middle voice, to lathe; hence 
to steep^ wet, to pour upon, drench; 
2. To dip a vessel, draw water; 3. 
To bap^tize.—'^Qw Testament. 



SECOND EDITION. 
BaTrnTo), 1. To dip repeatedly ; of 
ships, to sink them, passive voice, 
to lathe ; 2. To draw water ; 3. To 
laptize.—New Testament. 



It is true that the definition " bathe," is still retamed, 
and as we sometimes use this word in the sense of .to soak 
or to steep copiously with a fluid as well as m it, tliis 
might seem to leave the sense somewhat ambiguous. If 
so intended it would lessen the value of the dictionary, 
but in fact, the obliteration of the senses to steep, loet, pour 
upon, drench, is a sufficient admission that the word can not 
once be shown to have the sense of bathing loith a fluid, as 
distinct from being immersed in it. 



180 LIDDELL A]S"D SCOTT. 

The second signification, " to draw loater^'' is to " fill by 
dipping in," and thus to draw, see Liddell and Scott, ^(x.-nw. 
It is simply an elliptical mode of expression. Aristotle ^ 
gives it more explicitly thus, " One must dlj^ ^aipai (^. e., 
the bucket), and then draw it upP This sense of ^(xmoj 
and ^(xrnl'rco has been elaborately considered by Professor 
Stuart, who gives his views of the result thus, " The verb 
§anjM only is employed in order to convey the meaning to 
dip oitt^ to dip vp by plunging a vessel mto a hquid, and 
drawing it up." ^ 

Suffice it, then, that in the whole field of classic Greek 
the embodied learnmg of the age is not able to produce 
a smgle case which these respectable authors will ven- 
ture to offer as proof that f^a/ir/^oj is ever used for any 
thing distinctly other than immersion. If it had not 
been first of all publicly claimed by Pedobaptists (but too 
evidently to favor their own theological views), and then as 
I^ublicly, from a decent sense of what is due to the scholar- 
ship of the age, withdra^^m both in England and America, 
this result would not have been so marked. But this claim 
to a right in the word having been advanced, and then re- 
tracted, is the clearest possible evidence that it can not be 
sustamed by proof, even in the judgment of scholars the 
most competent to settle such a matter among Pedobaptists 
themselves. Thus all researches of English, German, and 
American linguists, have not been able to shake this result, 
estabhshed by Gale more than a hundred years ago, but so 
often caviled at and denied by partisan clamors as to be 
rarely recognized as a settled philological fact. 

It is true, indeed, that this lexicon mentions three other 

uses of the word ^ami'Qoi}, but they are given in the first 

1 Qusest. Mechan. c. 27. * Page 301. 



PKOFESSOK STUART. 181 

edition as jnetaphorical phrases, not proper senses of the 
term, as idioms, in fact. Thus Plato, ^ " I am one of those 
who were soalmd in loine (Bs^amiaftei^ojr^ yesterday.'^ So 
the authors of the lexicon render it. Professor Stuart brings 
the same passage forward as an illustration of the figurative 
use of ^(xjTTiloi in the sense of " overwhehnP We have the 
same figure when we speak of a man being " m wine^^'* 
meaning that his senses are metaphorically droAvned in what 
he has drank. ^^Head over ears in debt" and " droicned^ 
^. 6., with questions," are the only other figurative senses of 
the term they give in either edition. These can only be 
understood as referring to the proper sense of the word, ^. 6., 
immersion. We have in English just the same figures, and 
speak of a man as immersed in cares, or in debts, in study, 
or m business, or of a city as plunged in sleep, or by sudden 
attack, mto confusion and distress.^ In fact, we now use the 
word immerse figuratively just in those cases where a 
Greek would have used the term ^amlc^a). This does not 
unsettle, but rather establish the literal meanmg of the En- 
ghsli word. Thus even the metaphorical use always con- 
firms the literal signification of ^ciml'coj^ and is used on pur- 
pose to imply the largest j^ossiNe application of a supposed 
fluid that the nature of the case will admit. Such, then, 
are the established results at the present day of all sound 
critical inquiries as to the classical meaning of /^wTrr/^w, the 
same substantially as those to which we have seen that 
Professor Stuart arrived, after elaborate investigation, when 
he conceded that in classic literature he could find proof 
but of these two senses of the term in question : 

1 . To dip^ plunge^ or hnmerse. 

2. To overwhehn^ litei'ally and figuratively. 

' Conv. 176. ' See Jos. B. J. 4, 3, 3. 



182 THE SYNECDOCHE. 

The bnlj difference is that the later authorities do not sub- 
stantiate the second of these two senses as any part of the 
literal or figurative meaning of the word. 

Professor Robinson, in the last edition of his lexicon, gives 
the sense thus : " to dq^ in^^^ " to sinh^^'' " to immerseP He 
says : '' It is spoken of ships' galleys, etc., of horses sinkuig 
in a niarsh, or partially, to the breast ;" adding, " in Greek 
writers, as above exhibited, from Plato onward, f^ocmllM is 
every lohere to sink, to immerse, to overwhelm, either wholly 
or 2>ctrtially .'^'^ As he alone speaks of this partial immersion in 
this term, a little explanation of the laws of language may 
be necessary to reconcile all the statements. If a man says 
that he has dipped his finger in water, it is true that he only 
professes partially to have immersed himself^ but as he 
wholly immersed the finger, it would not be fair on this ac- 
count to say that " c?^)^" signified " to immerse wholly or 
partially,^ 

Besides that, however, there is 2i figure of speech to which 
all words are subject by which a part is put for the whole, 
and the whole for the part. It is treated of in every Rhetoric 
under the head of Synecdoche.^ Our words dip, sink, im- 
merse, are, however, quite as subject to this figurative use 
as ^anjl'Qoj^ If, for instance, a man told us that his horse, 
having got off the causeway, had sunk in the marsh, it 
would have been no contradiction if he asked assistance 
directly after to get him out, as his head and neck were still 
above the surface. We daily speak of hurying a man, mean- 
ing only a part of the man, his body, not his soul. Sailors 
are not the less said to dip their oars into the water in row- 
ing because they keep the handles out. Yet no one sup- 

^ See Leviticus, iv. 6, Deuteronomy, xxxiii. 24, where, however, jSanro 
is used. 2 See Campbell's Rhetoric, pp. 322, 332. Harper. 



KEW TESTAMENT USE. ] 83 

poses \h^9.<d figurative uses to disturb the literal or proper 
significations of the verbs " to hury^^'' or " to sinh^^^ or " to 
dip.'''' 

Thus is it abundantly established that /^m/tt/^w means in 
classic Greek to dlp^ to smJc^ to immerse^ and nothing else. 

{h.) New Testament use of ^ocmt'c^co. 

The only point now left is whether, in the New Testa- 
ment, the term §amiQo} possesses some new meaning or 
meanings not figurative, and different from all the classic 
usage in regard to it. This was the ground taken by Pro- 
fessor Stuart, in which he has been followed by Professor 
Robinson, in his lexicon of the jN'cav Testament. He gives 
the classical signification much as Liddell and Scott, " to dip 
in^ to sinJc, to immerse^ to d'lp in a vessel, to draio water." 
But in the ISTew Testament he contends that it has quite 
distinct senses; and means, "1. To loash^ to lave^ to 
cleanse hy loashing^ mid. and pass. aor. 1 in mid. sense, to 
wash one^s self i. 6., one's hands or person, to perform ablu- 
tion. 2. To baptize^ to administer the rite of baptism^ either 
that of John or of Christ. Pass, and mid. to be baptized^ or 
to cause one'^s self to be baptized^ i. 6., generally to receive 
baptism." 

In all this he takes rip the positions of Professor Stuart, 
defending them with, perhaps, more point, and* having the 
advantage of going over the ground last. 

Professor Stuart complains that he is " unable to find any 
thing in the New Testament which appears to settle whether 
the mode of baptism is determined by the sacred writers," 
although he is '•' quite ready to concede" that he finds no 
cases " which seem absolutely to determine that immersion 
was not practiced." Baptists, therefore, consider that he 



184 THE QUESTION XARROWED. 

has qiiite mistaken, where lies the-hurden of proof ^ that the 
Xew Testament was not written to settle the signiJScation 
of the word baptize. But the word baptize was adopted 
into the Xew Testament because weU understood to settle 
the nature of the command. It is not, therefore, necessary, 
in order to estabhsh the meaning, that we hunt up confirm- 
ations in each case. But to unsettle it a different usage of 
the word, in each case, must be clearly proved. 

The classical sense of the Greek term, which always im- 
phes immersion, was the settled and estabhshed meaning 
hundreds of years before the Xew Testament was written. 
The sense of ^(xml';oj is not, and has no right to be, like 
a piece of bhmk paper to the scholar when he first takes up 
a Greek Testament, it was not so to those who wrote it. 
The burden of proof, then, Hes on those who maintain that it 
is used in some special signification. 

Ajid this narrows down the whole question about the 
meaning of this long-disputed term to a point where any 
plain English reader of the Bible can, with a little help very 
easily obtained, settle it for himself Tvdth as much certainty 
as the profoundest scholar. The question is precisely this : 
Supposing that in every case where the Greek word ^unjl'^ia 
occurs, it had been translated irninerse^ are there any cir- 
cumstances connected with the biblicaP use of the term 
sufiicient to ^alter the sense of the English icord immerse, so 
that, instead of understanding it as meaning " to dip," we 
should have to regard it as signifying " to wash," " to lave," 
" to cleanse by washing," " to perform ablution." This is 
clearly the point at issue. 

Professor Robinson's argument amounts substantially to 

1 1 include under the term biblical here the Septuagint version of the 
Old Testament and the Apocrypha, as weU as the Xew Testament. 



PROFESSOR ROBINSON. 185 

this. He says: "In Hellenistic usage, and especially in 
reference to the rite of baptism, ^aTri/jw would seem to have 
expressed not always simply iinmersion^ but the more gen- 
eral idea of a5^^^i?^o?^ or affusionP It is proper to remark, 
however, that in establishing this new and more general 
sense of ^am.l'c,oi^ neither Philo nor Josephus assist Professor 
Robinson, though both of them Jews, and about cotem- 
poraries ^^ith Christ and his Apostles. On the contrary, 
they always use ^anxlX^M as synonymous with immersion as 
when Josephus, speaking of Herod murdering Aristobulus, 
says that he was ''''plunged?'' in a diving-bath until he was 
drowned, using ^cxnrt'^cj. The command to baptize, there- 
fore, if not a command to immerse, was recorded in a Greek 
word, of which two of the most celebrated Greek Jews of 
that day manifest no knowledge, and the proof of which 
has to be made out from the Bible alone, 

1. Professor Robinson's ^' especial'^^ argument to establish 
this new meaning, is fi'om the circumstances attending 
" the rite of baptism." Of this all can happily judge who 
consider those circumstances. 

He admits that Jesus was plunged " info^^ the Jordan at 
his OTVTi baptism, and that the vast multitude spoken of in 
Matthew, iii. 6 were baptized "^/^" water, going even 
further in this respect than Professor Stuart, who, however, 
had declared : " For myself, then, I cheerfully admit that 
/^ttTTT/^w in the New Testament, when applied to the rite 
of baptism, does in all probability involve the idea that this 
rite was usually performed by immersion, but not always." ' 

Professor Robinson would probably admit all this; indeed 
he has himself shown further that, in all cases wl^ere any 
prepositions are used in connection with the element of this 

* Page 362. 



186 PROFESSOE EOBIIN'SON. 

rite, tliey show it to have been " m'' water ;^ so that the 
case is narrowed down still further. We have a Greek 
verb that alioays implies immersion out of the Bible, which 
usually involves that idea even in sj^eaking of the rite of 
baptism itself in the ^N'ew Testament, and that, according 
to Professor Stuart, is never used in cases " which seem ab- 
solutely to determine that immersion was not practiced." ^ 
And yet Professor Robinson has in fact ventured entirely 
to expunge from his definition of Sanit'Qoj^ when it is used 
in the l^ew Testament, the established and distinctive 
character of the word, and substituted others in its j^lace, 
explaining in a " note" at the end that he only mtends to 
say, the word /^octtt/^w '' would seem not always to have ex- 
pressed shnply immersion, in Hellenistic usage, and espe- 
cially in reference to the rite of baptism." If by divine 
authority the word " ^mmer5e" were placed in our English 
Bibles wherever ^ocmlloj occurs m the original New Testa- 
ment, the Septuagint, and the Apocrypha, would it be right 
for a missionary in the Sandwich Islands, in j^reparing an 
English New Testament Lexicon, to represent the significa- 
tion of immerse^ as Dr. Robinson has given that of this 
term? What should we think if he first taught the 
heathen that in all other Eno-lish literature it sisfnified " to 
plunge into some fluid," but that in the New Testament it 
meant, " 1. To wash, to lave, to cleanse, by washing to per- 
form ablution ; 2. To baptize" adding, in a mere note, 
that he only intended to say that although " immerse" was 
the word used by divine authority, it would seem ni^t 
always simply to dip, but " especially m reference to 
the rite of baptism," to have the more general idea of 

^ I mean after the verb ^aixTi^Ld^ and governing the element. ^ P. 337. 



LUKE, XI. 38. 187 

ablution or aifusion. This is precisely what Professor 
Robinson has done. 

The reader has already in § III. examined the progress 
of opinion as to all the circumstances attending the rite 
of baptism in the ITew Testament, and has seen that in 
no instance do they prove the least excej)tion to immersion, 
but afford an overwhelming amount of proof that in all 
cases the primitive converts were "buried" in the waters of 
baptism. Rom. vi. 4. 

[NTow while §ami'Q(a and its derivatives occur about one 
hundred and thirty times in the I^ew Testament, there are 
only three or four occasions in which it does not either 
literally or figuratively refer to the rite of baptism. These 
are Mark, vii. 4, 8 ; Luke, xi. 38 ; Heb. ix. 10. But Professor 
Stuart has admitted that there is nothing which seems ab- 
solutely to determine that immersion was not practiced even 
here. So that there is not one of these cases in which, if the 
reader should translate this term by some word implying 
immersion, he would not have a perfectly intelligible mean- 
ing, and one supported, too, by many of the highest critical 
authorities. These cases are therefore at once too doubtful 
and too few to establish a new sense upon, much less to 
overturn th^ hundred and thirty others, backed by the 
w^hole classic usage, so as to shake the meaning of a public 
command. 

But Professor Robinson refers us to Luke, xi. 38, which 
might be literally rendered, " The Pharisee wondered be- 
cause he did not first immerse himself {^(iamiaOtj) before 
dinner." The Syriac here uses the same word as for the 
rite of baptism. According to it, the host " was surprised 
that he did not previously baptize." Before introducing a 
new sense like " washj^^ instead of " immerse," it miglit be 



IPS LUKE, XI. 38, 



^? 



well to consider if allusion was not had to the nse of 
bath, so customary before dimier. ^' Those who had been 
invited to a feast bathed themselves before they went," 
says Campbell, in his Notes on John, xiii. 10. But our Sa- 
viour seems to have been m\ited while publicly teaching in 
the neighborhood, and gomg in, he reclined at once at the 
table ready for the meal. The host had probably expected 
that he would have used the bath at his house, and was 
surprised, especially coming fi'om the dust and the heated 
crowd among^ whom he had been laborino:. 

But it must also be borne in mind that this man is ex- 
pressly mentioned as a Pharisee, on purpose evidently to 
account in part for his surprise, a surprise purposely given 
to enable Christ to reprove the Pharisaic observances as to 
ceremonial purity. " Xow do ye Pharisees make clean the 
outside of the cup," etc. 

By the Mosaic law, whoever touched a dead body was 
unclean, (even the dead body of a mouse,) or a grave, or the 
bone of a man ; and whoever touched one who was unclean, 
or an unclean garment or article of furniture, also became 
unclean. The law for all such was that they should " hathe 
themselves in water, "^"^ Lev. xv. 5-18; Numb. xix. 18, 19. 
Even the High Priest offering the yearly atonement was 
subjected to this rule. How carefully the Pharisees regard- 
ed this as enjoining an immersion of the whole body, we 
shall see. But in addition to the Mosaic law, they had also 
added certain cases of constructive^ or probable uncleanness. 
If a man had been to the marhet-place^ where flesh was on 
every side, or any place of public resort, where ceremonially 
imclean persons (Gentiles, for instance) must have abound- 
ed, special care was taken to purify themselves on returning 
liome. Mark, vii. 4, Spencer, on the "Ritual Laws of the 



LUKE, XI. 38. 189 

Hebrews," says, " Some of the Jews, ambitions for the credit 
of superior 23urity, frequently immersed their whole persons 
in watery the greater part, however, following a milder dis- 
ciphne, frequently washed only their hands." Ilhan ^ says, 
" Those who had departed from the house washed in a bath, 
or at least immersed their hands in water with the fingers 
distended." Grotius on Mark, vii. 4, says, " They cleansed 
themselves more carefully from defilement contracted at the 
market, by not only washing their hands, but even by im- 
mersing their bodies." Vatabulus, on the same passage, 
says, " They bathed their whole persons." ^ 

It seems, then, that there were tioo customs — ^the stricter 
Pharisees, after going into a promiscuous assembly, would 
have bathed themselves before eating. How particular they 
were, may be gathered from what Maimonides says, as 
quoted by Dr. Lightfoot, on Mark, \i\. 4 : " Wherever in 
the law washing of the body or garments is mentioned, it 
means nothing else than the washing of the whole body. 
For if any wash himself all over except the top of his little 
finger, he is still in his un cleanness." 

This seems by our Saviour's remark to have been one of 
the stricter Pharisees. He had conceived of our Lord 
as a person of extraordinary purity and holiness, hence 
his surprise would be natural at his reclining for dinner 
after mixing with the crowd, without first bathing him- 
self. 

This passage is certainly far enough fi-om favoring, much 
less requiring, the creation of a new sense for (^ami'^M. Be- 
fore doing so, it would be our duty to regard this as an in- 

1 Section 320. 

^ For the above extracts, I am chiefly indebted to Professor Ripley's 
i excellent Reply to Professor Stuart. 



190 MAEK, YII. 2, 3. 

stance of tlie rhetorical figure of which we have before 
spoken, in wliich the whole is sometunes put for a part, to 
save detail. We daily speak of a man washing himself^ 
where we mean only that he has washed his face, or even 
his hands. This does not alter the meaning of the verb 
wash / it is only a figurative use of " himself" for " his 
hands.^' So here, if the surprise of the Pharisee was only 
occasioned by the Saviour not dipping his hands in water 
— a still more frequent custom with all the Jews — the lite- 
ral meaning of ^(X7ni';o would remam quite unchanged. 
The same figure of speech would have to be supposed by 
whatever word was rendered. 

But Professor Robinson tells us to " compare the like 
circumstances in Mark, vii. 2, 3," where he considers that 
rinioi.uu is used synonpnously with Samilo), 

The whole of this supposition, howe\xr, Dr. Campbell 
has shown most clearly to arise from the want of a sufticient 
discrimination, where a contrast is intended. " For illus- 
trating this passage," he says, in the note on this text, 
"let it be observed first, that the two verbs rendered 
wash in the English translation are difierent in the origmal. 
The first is riipcj^iai^ properly translated 'toash;^ the second 
is ^unii:(x)PTui^ which limits us to a i^articular mode of wash- 
ing ; for |^tt7iT/;w denotes ' to plunge,' ' to dip.' " 

He translates the j^assage in question thus : " The Phari- 
sees, and indeed all the Jews who observe the tradition of 
the elders, eat not until they have washed their hands, by 
pourmg a little water upon them [viii)0)vioii) ; and if they 
be come from the market, by dipping them (3a7iTi';(x)VTai^,'^^ 
" 7\77rTf t^'," he says, " like the general word to icash^ in 
English, may be used for ^anriQeiv^ to dip^ because the 
genus comprehends the species, but not conversely, /^a^r- 



MARK, VII. 2, 3. 191 

T/£fti' for vinxetp^ the species for the genus. By this inter- 
pretation, the words which, as rendered in the common 
version, are unmeaning, appear both significant and em])hat- 
ical, and the contrast in the Greek is preserved in the trans- 
lation. The Vulgate does not confound the two verbs as 
the EngUsh does." 

That there is a contrast of thought or a very marked 
distinction intended to be indicated by the use of these two 
Greek words both rendered in Enghsh, " loash^^^ nearly all 
translators and commentators have agreed. Precisely what 
that distinction is has perplexed many. The Syriac says 
" The Pharisees except they carefully loash their hands, do 
not eat; and from the market place they do not eat except 
they IjaptizeP So the Vulgate. It is plain that the kind 
of washing here mdicated by ^ccmicu) is of a much more 
thorough character than by viTno), Bloomfield admits that in 
the latter case it refers to the washing of their bodies in 
opposition to that of their liands^ though he will not allow 
that this was by immersion. But certainly to bathe as the 
easiest way of washing the whole body, especially in those 
Eastern countries, would be the probable sense even apart 
from the meaning of the word itself The most literal ren- 
dering of this passage would be " The Pharisees except they 
v)ash their hands, eat not. And when they come from the 
market, except they immerse^ they eat not," and the only 
question ought to be whether we are to suppose the words 
" their hands^^ are left to be understood as repeated after 
the word " immerse" or not. The sole objection to this is 
that of Kuinoel and others who do not find what they 
imagine sufficient proof of such a general custom as com- 
plete immersion, but think with Campbell that the dipping 
was confined to the hands. Wo have, however, already 



192 MARK, YII. 4. 

seen the customs on this pomt from which it would appear 
that the laxer Jews and those who went but a Httle way, 
merely immersed their hands^ but the stricter sort of Phar- 
isees, especially when they went into the marhets or promis- 
cuous crowds where there was danger of defilement unless 
they "washed in a bath," i, 6., immersed themselves in 
water, did not eat. :But no distinct object of the verb 
being expressed, we might suppose "their hands," the 
object of vixpMviai^ to be here also the understood object of 
^ami^oji'Tul. What is certain is all that is necessary. The 
distinction between the two modes of ablution is here 
strongly marked by the terms used. The same distinction 
is accurately laid down in the Mishna. The Jews, it is clear, 
had two distinct modes of washing for purification, one by 
pouring, and the other by immersion. They were dis- 
cussed in separate Treatises. The Treatise Yadaim being 
apparently devoted exclusively to the ablution of the hands 
by poitring so much water uj^on them, and several other 
Treatises to immersion? So far, therefore, from this pas- 
sage being favorable to a more general sense to the term 
/9«.7t/5w, whichever way it is construed, it demonstrates a 
very S23ecific use of the word, implies immersion most 
strongly, and is put m contrast with vimM^ to tcas/i. 

The reader will probably be surprised to learn that upon 
two cases like these, where alone in the [N'ew Testament this 
verb occurs apart from the rite of baptism. Dr. liobin- 
son has undertaken to erase from his definitions the specific 
sense of " immerse" from ^nnii'^^ix) wherever it occurs in this 
portion of holy w^rit. It is true, however, we have three 
instances of the noun, now to be considered. 

Mark, vii. 4 and 8, may seem, perhaps, the strongest to 
* See " Eighteen Treat, from the Mishna," bj Dr. Raphall, Lond., p. 35T. 



MARK, YII. 4. 193 

the mere English reader. " And many other thmgs there 
be which they have received to hold as the washing 
(panTKT^ovg) of cups, and pots, and brazen vessels, and of 
tables," etc. So om- English version reads. 

Here again the Syriac has it the haptisin of cups, etc. 
And so Campbell renders it, because this baptism of them 
was of a religious and ceremonial character ; a Pharisaic 
observance added to the Mosaic law. The reader will 
easily find proofs of two distinct kinds of religious purifica- 
tion, both for persons and things, one was by pouring 
water over the object, and the other by immersion in water. 
Both are laid down with great exactness in the Mishna. 
The first as we haA^e seen might be represented by rlnxM^ the 
second most appropriately by ^aniTQw, The question here 
is whether there is any thing to prove the more thorough 
ablution not intended, so that we must alter the mean- 
ing of the word to accommodate the sense. A little con- 
sideration will show that the proof is all the other way. 

So far as the baptism of cups, and pots, and brazen ves- 
sels are concerned, there can at least be no difficulty in sup- 
posing immersion. Even the law of Moses had prescribed 
that the dead body of any animal or creeping thing touch- 
ing any vessel or garment, or skin, or sack, it must be dipped 
in water before it would be clean, and a vessel in which any 
work had been done must be immersed in like manner. 
Lev. xi. 32. 

But it was some washing much more inconvenient and 
less founded on the nature of things than all this, tliat the 
Evangelist here charges on the Pharisees.^ 

^ Dr. Gill, in his commentary on this passage, has shown how exact- 
ing were the Pharisees in requiring all vessels to be covered with wi\iQT 
for constructive uncleanness. 

9 



104 HEBREWS, IX. 10. 

Tlie word rcnderecl ^' tables-^ means strictly couches 
(xAnwi), and it lias been asked, could the Jews have been 
in the habit of immersing whole couches ? But this diffi- 
culty soon vanishes from an oriental mind. 

1. Let it be observed that these couches were used in- 
stead of chairs to recline upon while eating ; and the food 
and gravy constantly spilled on them would render them 
frequently unclean, literally and ceremonially. 

2. The Jews were in the habit of distinguishmg between 
the couch itself and the bedstead,^ or elevated part of the 
floor, as it generally was, on which the couch proper was 
laid. In Persia, to this day, this latter consists at times 
only of " tico cotton quilts''^ easily spread.^ This accounts 
for the couch being so easily carried by one who had been 
paralytic.^ These would often need di2")ping in. water to be 
ceremonially clean if animal matter touched them. 

3. The object of the T\Titer was to set forth the cibsurd 
lengths to which the Pharisees enjoined these cleansmgs^' 
and it has been shown by Dr. Gill that they required the 
whole to be cleansed by hnniersion when they had been, 
defiled ; nothuig, therefore, can well be more certain than 
that suiDcrfluous immersions of this kind were specifically 
intended; for the object of the T\Titer would be best ac- 
complished by exhibiting the ftdl extent of their trouble- 
some requirements. 

HebrcAvs, ix. 10, refers doubtless, to the frequent insti- 
tuted dippings in water, both of persons, vessels, clothes, 
and skins, ordamed Lev. xi. 32. 15. 5-18, etc., for ceremo- 
nial purification. This was the evident design of the writ- 
ter ; ?. e.^ to show the inconveniences of the Jewish relig- 
ion and its inadaptedness to perpetuity and universal ex- 

1 Dent. iii. 11. ^ g^^ Robinson's Calmut, Beds. ^ Matt. ix.S. 



JSTAAMAN. 195 

tension. The above are the only reasons from tlie Kcw 
Testament adduced by Professor Robinson, apart from the 
rite of baptism, already considered, for changing the mean- 
ing of the word ^anTl^a), Closely and fairly examined, in- 
stead of altering the sense o{ (^(xmi'i;^^ they all tend directly 
to confirm it. 

But Dr. R. pleads that there are cases in the Apocrypha 
and Septuagint, at least, where ^anji'QM is used, and in which 
the idea of immersion is inapplicable. It is even urged that 
these are sufficient to establish a peculiar Hellenistic usage 
and meaning of the term, existing before the New Testament. 

But it is not pleaded tliat all these cases together are 
sufficient to show that the common Hellenistic usage was 
not the same as the classical meaning " immerse." Indeed 
Professor Stuart gives us the primary and usual meaning of 
the word in these writings, to plunge^ to immerse^ to dip in^ 
quoting ^ " Naaman went down and plunged (B^anxloitjo) 
seven times into the river Jordan," as an instance. He 
even says that in the " majority of examples" of this verb 
and ^unruj^ that is the sense. The exceptional cases, 
" which are few in number," "^ are given. All of these are 
quite insufficient to disturb the sense of ^amit^M^ in an ordi- 
nary command, however regarded. 

But Professor Robinson, strange to say, less con«eding 
here than Professor Stuart, brings forward 2 Kings, v. 14, 
to prove that the term is 7iot used in the specific sense of 
'' immersGj'^'' but in the more general one of " tmsh,^'' quot- 
ing in proof verse 10, where tlie command under which he 
acted was given to g6 and tcash (^ovm) seven times in Jor- 
dan. Thus instead of lettiiig the specific term exi)lain the 
more general one, he wishes tlu; more general term to un- 
^ 2 Kings, V. 14. ' Piigo ^Ot. 



196 JUDITH, XII. 7. 

settle tlie whole usage of the more specific. Is this right ? 
What could not be unsettled on such principles ? This is 
the more inexcusable, as m his Hebrew Lexicon (Art. ^into) 
he has given this very passage^ as an illustration of the 
meanhigs " to dip, to immerse," translating it in full, " and 
dipped himself seven times in Jordan." 

But supposing loi^ in the direction given simply meant 
to '-'- wasli^^'' then verse 14 tells us specifically how this wash- 
mg was actually performed, i. 6., by inmiersion. The com- 
mand here, however, implied immersion. For lovoai kuTdxig 
kr 7(5 ^loQddyy should be rendered " bathe thyself seven 
times in Jordan." Trench in his " Synonpnes of the ]N"ew 
Testament," says that Aouw " is not so much to ' was/i^ as to 
' hathe^ and loUodai^ to bathe one's self,' implies always not 
the bathing of a part of the body, but of the ichole^'^'' quot- 
ing Hebrews, x., 23, as an example. ISTothing, therefore, 
can well be more clear, than the specific sense both of the 
command, and of ^anTiljx) here. 

Judith, xii. 7, is adduced by Professor Robinson as by 
Professor Stuart. The passage is translated in King James' 
version, Judith " went out m the night into the Valley of 
Bethuha, and loashed herself (e^aniL'QeTo) in a fountain by 
the camp." The question here is, did the writer intend to 
say that she bathed herself m the fountain, or simply that 
she washed herself icith its water. The point is not which 
of these circumstances really took place. Probably neither 
of them did, for the whole passage is an evident and most 
improbable fiction. N^othing can be more unlikely than 
that a Jewish woman should have been allowed to pass in 
and out of a camp besieging a Jewish city, at her own 
pleasure. Hence we may, if we will, think it very unlikely 
^ 2 Kings, V. 14. 



JUDITH, XII. 7. 197 

and indecorous, that she should immerse herself. It is not 
so much so as other parts of this romance, but the trans- 
lator's duty is to put the improbable thing in Enghsh, just 
as it stands in the story. 

The object of the writer is to represent her as a person 
of rare piety, according to the Pharisaic standard, but hv- 
ing in the midst of a camp of unclean persons, and sur- 
rounded by ceremonial defilements. Hence this custom of 
nightly bathing is mentioned, the fountain being also care- 
fully recorded to give plausibihty to the narrative, and also 
that it was hy nighty when she would not be observed. 
There were often such places at the outskirts of cities, with 
proper and separate accommodations for men and women 
to bathe. In the sixth century conveniences of this kind at 
the Pool of Siloam were found by Antonius the Martyr. 
Still it was urged that this was '' in (bv) the camp," and at 
night. The utmost that can, however, be argued from that 
circumstance, is, that it was somewhere probably loithin^ but 
possibly only near the space inclosed by sentries, a circuit 
perhaps of miles^ and in which this seems to have been a 
secluded and solitary valley. The supposition of a lone 
woman, and perhaps her maid, going out and in at night to 
wash at a fountain, in a camp, must have been attended 
with about as many difiiculties, as to delicacy and safety, as 
if we suppose her to have bathed. But there is this diffi- 
culty to the former supposition — it was not cleanliness^ but 
peculiar ceremonial sanctity^ that is here being represented, 
and when in verse 19 it is expressly said that ^^ she caone in 
clean'''' — that is, ceremonially clean — there is no room to 
doubt that she bathed her body in the water, according to 
Jewish custom. Spencer, in his " La^ys of the IlebrcAvs," 
brings this very case forward to prove that " the Jews when 



198 ECCLESIASTICUS, XXXIY. 25. 

about to perform their vows, sometimes cleansed the whole 
body in a bath." Livmg as she was by day, in the midst ol 
the unclean, she could only haA'e made clean Pharisaically 
by immersing nightly. This supposition is necessary to the 
plaasihility of the narrative, and we are not even bound to 
beheve in Xh^ probability of any part of the story. 

The only other case adduced is Sirach, xxxi. 25, [or Ec- 
clus : xxxiy. 25] "He who is baptized {SanxiX^ouEvo^^ from a 
dead body, and toucheth it again, what does he profit by 
his bath or bathing," toJ Aoutocu «urou. In ^N" umbers, xix. 19, 
we find that whoever touched the body, or even the bone of 
a man, was to be unclean seven days, and as the concluding 
ceremony of his purification, " to bathe himself in loaterP 

Let it be granted that y>^"i, the Hebrew term for ''^batlie^'^ 
here might mean less than immerse. Yet followed as it is 
by -, which here must be rendered " «*;?," it is clear what it 
meant in the eyes of the son of Sirach. His speakmg of 
the " bath" in the same verse, makes it plain. And the fol- 
lowing passage produced by Lightfoot, in Matthew, iii. 6, 
from Maimonides, renders all these passages beyond further 
dispute. " Wheresoever in the law washing of the body 
or garments is mentioned, it means notliing else than the 
washiyig of the ichole body. For if any wash himself all 
over, excej)t the very top of his little finger, he is still m his 
uncleanness." Lightfoot on Mark, ra. 4, produces also 
from another Je^^ish writer a sentence which shows that 
pollution occasioned by the touch of the dead was so great, 
that the i^erson " must 2:>licn ye his whole body."^ The spe- 
cific sense is plam beyond doubt, here. 

^ Ripley, p. 83. If it were the fact, which it is not, that reference here 
IS had to the custom of luasliing the whole of the clothes in water^ 
see Leviticus, xi. 25-28, as well as the immersion of the person, the 



DIP A PERFECT EQUIVALENT. 199 

Thus, in fact, not a single passage has been adduced, in 
which less than the primary idea of the word " immersion" 
can be accorded to it, without positive detraction from the 
meaning of the original, either in the ISTew Testament, the 
Septuagint, or the Apocrypha.^ 

Thus every use of the word, classic or Hellenistic, ht- 
eral or figurative, contributes to show that the command 
to baptize is a coiwinand to immerse^ and that the word 
^aml^Lo^ is nevei'' used literally (or even figuratively) mth- 
out reference to this, the radical idea of the word, so that 
our verb to dip is its perfect equivalent. 

etymology of DiiD shows that it is to wash by treading the garments in a 
trough filled with water, therefore implying immersion. 

1 The fact to which Eobinson alludes of the old Italic version transfer- 
ring haptize into the Latin, certainly does not show that there was any 
thing in the method of performing the rite which " immergd''' would not 
properly indicate ; but simply that this word having been used first, had 
become a technical term in that language, through the preaching of the 
Apostles, and was thus naturally transferred as a thousand other such 
words are. TertuUian and all the Latin fathers at least continually use 
" Tm^ere" and ^^ Imergerer The baptismal fonts still found among the 
ruins of the most ancient G-reek Churches in Palestine, as at Tekoa and 
Gophna, and goiag back apparently to very early times, are quite too late 
to affect this question. No one pretends that they belong to the first or 
even to the second centuries of the Christian era. They have nothing, 
therefore, to do with the question of the alteration which he has made of 
the meaning of the word jSaTrri^cj in the New Testament. That the gen- 
eral custom of the early Church was immersion is too clear to bo doubted ; 
nor can a single case be shown of any thing else up to a.d. 230 ; later 
than this it was in fierce dispute whether less than that was valid bap- 
tism, even in cases of the sick and dying. The fonts are boj^ond doubt 
too late to weigh in this matter, but the ancient custom of baptistries 
built separately from the churches is decisive the other way, for had 
sprinkling originally been the customary baptism none would have thought 
of erecting a house for that purpose. 



200 ILLUSTRATION COMPLETED. 

The case is in every way, therefore, as plain as that sup- 
posed at the commencement of this chapter/ It is in fact 
plainer. To put it fairly, it should be stated thus : The 
commanding officer of a vessel tells one of the hands to 
" dip a bucket overboard." He pleads that the meaning of 
" dip" is uncertam, and that Milton uses it for " moisten." 
The officer, therefore, tells him to '' dip it hi the water" 
and the man complahis that " m" does not always mean 
" within" or " mto." 

The commander sets him an example and dips the bucket 
down " mfo" [^ ic] the river. Mar. i. 9, and shows hun thou- 
sands of cases in which it is dipped "^V [£>'] the same 
water. Matt. iii. 6. But he still rephes that all these in- 
stances do not prove that the command might not as well 
be performed m some other way. The object for which 
the order was given is pomted out to the man, clearly im- 
plying immersion. 

Finally, the history of the word itself is gone into, and it 
is shown that literally and properly the term " dip''' always 
involves an " immersion ;" or if it ever have another sense 
(which ^(xmi^oj never has), it is so remote as not to affect 
the case, and that in the order in question, the verb to dip 
means to immerse^ or it means nothing. 

And so the command given us by the Captam of our 
Salvation to be baptized, is a command to be immersed, if it 
is any thmg. 

The question discussed in this chapter is not at all as to 
the impjortance of baptism ; that ^^dll be treated of else- 
where. It is not as to whether we are responsible for un- 
derstanding it, or whether we may or may not be sincerely 
mistaken ; that depends upon each man's knowledge or 
1 See pp. 143, 4. 



KEMOTE SUBTLETIES. 201 

means of knowing the truth. The simple question we 
have discussed throughout is, what is the meaning of the 
coimnand itself ? 

We are far, indeed, from intending to represent, even by 
the illustration introduced, that our Pedobaptist brethren 
would hitentionally use any such subtleties in regard to a 
Divine ordinance so obvious, if the case stood before them 
in their native tongue as plainly, and with the same author- 
ity, that it does m the original. But it has been for the 
purpose of illustrating the difficulties that have been arti- 
ficially, however sincerely, thrown around a very plain 
question, as well as the progress toward their removal made 
during the last hundred years, that this slight figure has 
been used. In the niceties of a dead language there are 
continual plausibilities and incentives to the exercise of in- 
genuity that beguile the most candid and learned to an in- 
calculable extent. And as a generous and zealous counsel 
will fully persuade himself of the truth and justice of some 
cause that he has volunteered to defend, when no impartial 
person, with the same knowledge of the facts, Avould trust 
in it for a moment ; and from believing it himself, will make 
use of remote subtleties that it will take much patient 
thought to unravel ; so in the order of defending sprinkling, 
plausibilities have sometimes been assumed for facts, and 
exceptions for rules, in regard to the construction of a very 
simple command in Greek : which, stripped of a learned 
disguise, and put into the language in Avhich both parties 
are accustomed to think and to speak, would at once ap- 
pear to all, inconsistences the most strange and inconceivable. 

9* 



202 IMPOKTAXCE OF BELIEYEE'S BAPTISM. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE i:iIPOETAXCE OF BELIEVEES' B.VPTISM. 

§ I. Gexeral Yiew of the Subject. 

All that large, respectable, and increasing class of Pedo- 
baptists who concede the points previously discussed, and 
vet do not yield their personal adhesion and obedience to 
the ordhiance of believers' baptism, justify themselves on 
the ground that they do not esteem the matter one of suf- 
ficient importance. They admit the command originally 
given was to immerse, but say that sprinkUng will do as 
tcell ; that a drop is as well-pleasing as an ocean to Him 
who reads the heart. Baptism, they concede, was instituted 
as a profession of personal faith in Christ, but they think the 
ratification of fluth aftenoavd ^viU do as well. TTe have 
seen from the concessions of Pedobaptists what the com- 
mand is ; the point now at issue between them and the 
Baptists is whether we are at Hberty to deviate fi'om it. 

But here the Baptist pleads at once that a command from 
ichich ice are at liberty to deviate^ is to us no commandj at 
all. It is only ad^'ice at best, and not always that. K the 
injunction, for mstance, be conditional, then, in the absence 
of those conditions, it ceases to enjoin. There are, Bai3tists 
admit. Christians to whom the command of baptism does 
not apply. Persons converted on a death-bed are cases of 
this sort. In these instances, the best respect that can be 
shown to the ordinance is to let it alone, as Christ himself 
taught us in the case of the d^dng thief, but certainly not to 



POSITIVS INSTITUTIONS. 203 

admit tlie command as binding and then substitute some- 
thing else instead. That lowers down, by example, the 
Avhole tone of Christian piety and obedience. The Saviour 
did not, as a Papist would have done, command some of 
the women that stood by bew^ailing to fetch a little water, 
nor the beloved disciple, to whom he committed his mother, 
to asperse the quivering penitent. Thus he taught us that 
it is more acceptable to him to avow a general direction to 
be no command to us in certain cases, than to substitute 
something else in its place for the sake of a quasi fulfillment 
of the command. All this fDrms no real exception ; it only 
narrows the question down to this : Is it important to obey 
a command of Christ when we know it to be applicable to 
us ? Thus viewed, it seems beyond discussion, appealing 
too directly to the moral sense. It may, however, be illus- 
trated by parallel circumstances of moral obligation. 

Herein consists the speciality of positive institutions. 
Moral commands rest simply upon inherent relations, but 
positive institutions simply upon the authority of the law- 
giver. If the injunction had been to do " some great 
tliing^^'^ ^ in which could have been traced some connection 
mth the good to be effected, men would probably, like 
ISTaaman, be more willing to comply. We may obey moral 
injunctions because we see our interests bound up in them. 
But positive commands test the principle simply of obedience 
to Divine authority. To say that one institution of Christ 
is of no importance, cuts at the root of all ordinances, as 
they rest simply upon the same basis ; throws us back for 
all our religion upon our moral philosophy and eternal re 
lations ; and strikes at all revelation. For if nothing in re- 
ligion is to be binding, on the authority of God, until Ave 
* 2 Kings, V. 13. 



204 CAUSE OF PUSEYISM. 

can first see the wisdom of it, even a Divine command is 
nothing but advice. We must be prepared to substitute 
the tenth day for rest and worship instead of the Sabbath, 
if a French philosopher can show that the decimal system is 
more advantageous. The Lord's Su^^per, the ministry, the 
Church, all must be subject to the refining crucible of a 
utilitarian philosophy, or the newest fashion of supj^osed 
convenience. 

Within the last twenty years the whole principle, or want 
of principle, on which this supposed non-hnportance of be- 
lievers' baptism rests, has received the most signal rebuke 
in the rise and temporary success of Puseyism. For what 
is it, if weighed, but the pantmg of earnest, if self-righteous, 
hearts for a religion of positive institutions. It is the re- 
bounding of the poj)ular mind from the excess of laxity and 
indifierence as to ordinances, into the old extreme of super- 
stition. But the laxity arose out of the contradiction be- 
tween an evangelical* faith and infant baptism. This tlie 
" ISTorth British Review" has shown m passages before 
quoted. 

'No wonder Episcopacy gains ground in Kew England. 
Men want a religion of positive institutions, and not one of 
which each part in turn, except some abstract faith, is de- 
clared every Sabbath from the pulpit, and in every act, a 
matter of no importance. 

Does St. Paul make the sacraments of religion unimport- 
ant in their places ? Does he not say, " I prMse you, breth- 
ren, that ye fee/? the ordiiia^ices as I delivered thern unto you .^" 

Much has been said of the undue stress laid by Baptists 
upon correctness m regard to a ceremony. But while 
modern evangehcal Pedobaptists are thus blammg them on 
one side, the Church of Bome and millions of Protestants 



EUCHAEISTIC ELEMENTS CHANGED. 205 

are more violent against them on the other. Baptists at 
least occupy a consistent medium. The vast majority of 
those who uphold infant sprinkling, do so from an exagger- 
ated and idolatrous belief that the magical efficacy and power 
of baptism make those who receive it, ''members of Christ, 
and heirs of heaven," by an ojnis operatiim. This was the 
ancient extreme, against which for centuries Baptists pro- 
tested. But now they are assailed on the other hand by a 
large body of Christians faUmg into just the opposite error, 
and accountinof all the sacraments of relicrion as of no im- 
portance. 

The contests of all Protestant Churches with Rome, on 
the subject of the Lord's Supper, render certain the ulti- 
mate progress of that principle on which rests the import- 
ance of believers' baptism. These Churches have all agreed 
as to the necessity of upholding the Lord's Supper, and of 
keeping it as it was delivered unto them. What reproaches 
have not been heaped upon the Roman Catholics for pre- 
suming to alter it by taking away the wine from the laity. 
But then is it not at least equally blameworthy in Protest- 
ants to have kept back the immersion from baptism. Sup- 
posing that, instead of bread and wine, a church should 
substitute, of its own notion, other elements, such as potatoes 
and milk, none would feel more shocked at it, we are per- 
suaded, than those very brethren who are most active in 
advocating a substitution of sprinkling for the original im- 
mersion. If it should be urged that the word " supper" 
admitted of the pi'oposed articles as well as those which 
have always been used, would that be sufficient to reconcile 
Christians to the alteration ? But while there may easily be 
a supper of other substances than bread and whie, the very 
term haptisra necessitates an immersion. 



206 CLIKIC BAPTISM. 

But the importance of a rigid adherence to positive pre- 
cepts may well be illustrated from the effects of one of the 
best intentioned deviations in regard to baptism itself upon 
the whole doctrine of the early Churches. Sprinkling was 
substituted first for immersion through " Clinic JBaptism^'* 
or the baptism of those reclming on couches by reason of 
extreme sickness. For the sake of these, first pouring and 
then aspersion were introduced at about the middle of 
the third century. But then this was, by many, esteemed 
no baptism at all, and Cyprian, the great early defender of 
infant baptism had to plead earnestly in vindication of its 
sufficiency in extreme cases. And still many nicknamed 
such persons " Clinics instead of ChristiansP The feel- 
ing on this point was very strong against Cyprian in the 
Churches, and he cheerfully conceded that if any of the 
pastors deemed it invalid, they could, ivithout any breach 
of good fellowship, or charge of anabaptism^ do — -just what 
we do, immerse them afterward. 

Bingham says,^ "As to the question about the validity 
of Clinic baptism, that is, whether persons who were only 
sprinkled with water in their beds in time of sickness, and 
not immersed or washed all over the body in baptism, were 
to be looked upon as complete Christians ; Cyprian, for his 
own part, resolves it in the affirmative. But yet if any 
bishops were otherwise persuaded that it was not lavful 
baptism^ and upon that ground gave such persons a new 
immersion, he professes that he prescribes to none, but 
leaves every one to act according to his own judgment and 
discretion." This case was about a.d. 250. Doubtless 
many a sick man on his dying bed desired much to profess 
his Saviour in baptism, and it appealed strongly to the heart 
^ Book 2, chap. vii. sec. v. 



HOW TO PEEYENT SACERDOTALISM. 207 

and imagination of Christian charity to bestow it, even at 
the expense of deviating from the rule. It was a strong 
case. And yet we may noio see that, had those early Chris- 
tians told such dymg penitents the story of the thief upon 
the cross instead, and shown them that such cases were 
doubtless left on purpose to bear witness against all idolatry 
of the outward signs, and to show that baptism was not a 
saving ordinance^ it would have been a most timely protest, 
and probably have saved after generations an awful revela- 
tion of the man of sin. Sacerdotalism would have been 
stifled at its birth, and Koman Catholicism been averted.^ 

Were Peaobaptists faithfully to restore the original insti- 
tution, and immerse their candidates, it would soon put an 
end to infant baptism. Nothing but adult baptism would 
then be tolerated. 

The importance of keeping the ordinances as they were 

^ It was at this time and for long after, a generally understood rule, 
however, that those who had received only clinic baptism were to be 
held forever after as incapable of being ordained to any ofBce in the 
church. The Council of Neocesarea especially ordains this, a.d. 312. It 
has been said that it was only to mark disapprobation of such as had 
delayed baptism till sickness. But the account given by Cornelius, a.d. 
251, of the ordination of Novatus shows that it was at first rather from 
doubts as to the lawfulness, and, in many minds, the validity of such bap- 
tisms. Speaking of that ordination, he says, " All the clergy and many 
of the laity resisted it, since it was not lawful that one who had been bap- 
tized in his sick bed ly aspersion as be was, should be promoted to the 
order of the clergy. The bishop, however, requested that it should be 
granted to him to ordain only the one." Describing his baptism, Corne- 
lius says, "Being supposed at the point of death he was baptized by as- 
persion in the bed on which he lay, if indeed it he proper to say that one 
like him did receive baptism^ (Euscbius, Book 6, chap, xliii.) Such is, 
perhaps, the earliest distinct instance of clinic baptism on record given in 
the language of a cotemporary. 



208 XEGLECT OF OEDIXAXCES. 

delivered, may be illustrated again from the practical ten- 
dency of the contrary com-se to destroy all the sacramental 
part of religion. This has been exhibited during the last 
hundred years. The open neglect of infant baptism is ob- 
vious, and has awakened the attention of the Pedobaptist 
Churches in Xew England. But the decline of attention 
to all the admitted requirements of positive religion is not 
sufficiently felt. There are vast multitudes of men who 
are generally considered, and indulge the hope themselves, 
that they are Christians, but yet hve for years without mak- 
ing any profession of rehgion, without any baptism, or any 
communion, without family prayer, with but a meager at- 
tendance at pubUc worship, and but a lax observance of the 
Sabbath. The proportion of such persons is increasing 
through the regions of evangehcal Pedobaptism, and the 
secret of all this is lax views of the importance of positive 
religion. 

Directly ministers begin to ai'gue as an excuse for diso- 
beying a divine command, that " a drop is as good as an 
ocean," it is not difficult to foresee that their people will 
carry it one step fm-ther, and say, " Xone is as good as a 
drop/' It may not at once be said, or in so many words ; 
it may only manifest itself in action, or the want of action, 
but the inference wiU soon be drawn. The tendencv of 
the whole is to Quakerism. Xow, as in man the soul and 
body are united, and neither can operate in the present 
state without the other, so is it in rehgion. God has 
clothed the spuitual essence of faith and love with a corpo- 
reity of symbol and sacrament from which they can not be 
separated without death ensuing. 



BAPTISM WITNESSED BY A:N INFIDEL. 209 

§ II. The Teachings and Professions of Christian Baptism 
Important. 

The first great lesson of Christian baptism is that per- 
sonal allegiance, and an implicit submission to the religion 
of the New Testament, lies at the entrance of a pure Chris- 
tianity. 

About fifty years ago, an ofiicer of the French army, a 
gentleman of distinguished connections, was taken prisoner 
in the war between France and England, brought to Liver- 
pool, and put upon his parole. Strolling one fine Sabbath 
afternoon, in company with some brother officers in the 
same situation with himself, outside the city, he saw a com- 
pany gathered round a small sheet of water, where baptism 
was about to be administered. Curiosity led him to ap- 
proach, when he perceived some boys annoying those 
present, by throwing pebbles into the water. There were 
several ladies going to be baptized, and, Frenchman-like, a 
feeling of gallantry induced him to persuade his brother 
officers to join with him, and form a " guard of honor" 
round the water. Pie could not understand much English, 
but he soon gathered that these persons were consecrating 
themselves to the service of their Saviour. He noticed 
also that the minister, a gentleman of superior education, 
appealed to the New Testament as the foundation of all 
that he said and did ; not to the authority of the Church, 
not to reason, but to the words of Christ and his Apostles. 

Brought up in Paris during the fervor of the first French 
Revolution, not only was he an utter infidel himself, but lie 
did not know that any persons of education now believed 
the New Testament. He supposed tliat Christianity might 
do to amuse children and uneducated people, but that no 



210 A fee:n^ch consul 

intelligent persons in the nineteenth century believed the 
New Testament to be true. 

His chief surjDrise was that the minister, candidates, and 
people, all so evidently considered the words of Christ and 
his Apostles to be of binding authority in this matter. So 
deep Avas the impression thus made, that he resolved to do 
what he never had done, " read the N'ew Testament for 
himself." From the moment he began, the truthfulness of 
the narrative became to him unquestionable. The majesty 
and authority of the words of Christ laid hold upon his 
heart. He read on and on, retired for a fortnight from the 
company of his fellow officers, and at last, to save himself 
from further interruptions, wrote a card, and fastened it on 

the door of his own room — " M. De engaged readmg 

the N^ew Testament." He rose from the study of that 
book a converted man, and soon was himself buried mth 
Christ by baptism. 

At first, his friends would ridicule the New Testament in 
his presence. But he soon silenced them thus : " Gentle- 
men, have you ever read this book ?" "- No." " But I 
have, and it is not what you imagine. Read it through, 
and then ridicule it as much as you please. But, until 
then, unless you vnsh personally to hurt me, ridicule it no 
more." In that way, by the earnest conviction of its di- 
vine authority which had first impressed him at the water's 
edge, he persuaded at least one brother officer to read that 
blessed book, who also became a Christian, and united with 
the same Church. 

In his youth, the writer of these pages remembers well 
to have seen him. Kind, gentlemanly, polished to the 
highest degree, he became bold, earnest, and active as a 
Christian, beyond most around him. From being a soldier 



4 



ope:n^s his house. 211 

under the greatest of earthly generals and potentates, he 
became a soldier under the Captain of Salvation. So 
strong was his attachment to his religion and his religious 
friends, that, on the restoration of peace, his brother, who 
became Keeper of the Seals of France, procured him an 
appointment as consul at one of the English ports. Through- 
out the whole remainder of a long hfe, but recently closed, 
he retained, to a smgular degree, and with a touching 
fidelity the impression, first made at those baptismal waters, 
that an implicit allegiance of heart and life to Jesus Christ, 
and submission to the system of religion taught in the 
New Testament alone is Christianity. He was never or- 
dained. But, while French consul, he opened his house 
each day and conducted worship, preaching to his family, 
and such private friends and countrymen as his station 
gathered round him.^ Meeting on one occasion with a 
note which pleased him, written by a pastor to a member 
of his Church, he addressed him a letter, such as one of the 
Christians of early times might be supposed to have writ- 
ten to another. " Dear Sir and Brother," it began : " I 
shall not apologize for troubling you with this letter. If 
you are a true minister of the Lord Jesus Christ, as I take 
you to be, you will be glad to aid a brother soldier in his 
great conflict." He then narrated the history of his con- 
version, and requested a correspondence, which contmued 
for about twenty years. 

Having invited the minister to come and visit him ; he 
had, like Peter, calculated the hour of his arrival, made an 
appointment for service, sent and gathered his friends and 

^ His ignorance of denominations and parties produced great simplicity 
of character and address. * 



212 "follow me." 

acquaintances, employing even tlie bell-man of the town to 
giA^e the matter publicity. 

Visiting London, the minister insisted that he should 
preach an evening lecture to the congregation. "With 
broken Enghsh, but a heart full of love to Christ, he took 
for his text those words of the Saviom-, "Follow me." 
This, he said, was the tcord of command given by the great 
Captain of our salvation. He frankly spoke then of his 
own former life as a soldier, and how he had been led into 
allegiance and obedience to Christ, proceeding to show that 
this was a Captain who was never conquered, but went 
forth conquering and to conquer, on which account He had 
a right to say " Follow me ;" a Captain who had never re- 
treated an inch of gromid, and therefore He said " Follow 
me" — who had never lost a soldier — who had never bidden 
one to go where he had not gone before, but through peril, 
and temptation, through suffermg and death, had led the 
way, and therefore said ''''Follow me." His broken English, 
his military aii', his sharp accent, as he gave out, over and 
again, " the word of command," left deep the impression 
on many a heart that night, that he had learned the great 
lesson of- baptism at that water's side, as but few even of 
Christ's followers learn it — that implicit obedience and alle- 
giance to Jesus Christ is the first requisite of Christianity, 

This is the great lesson needed by the present age, both 
practically and speculatively. Whiere the outward profes- 
sion of Christianity costs no suffering — where a certain 
measured amount of respect for religion, and profession of 
it, is highly reputable, half-heart edness is the great j)ractical 
besettmg sin of us all. And now when Roman Catholic- 
ism and Puseyism on the one side are putting the authority 
and customs of the Church above fhe New Testament, and 



THE DISCIPLES OF SOCKATES. 213 

when infidelity in all its forms and shades on the other, is 
putting above it the reason and moral philosophies of the 
day, there is no lesson of Christian truth more central^ 
more Catholic and valuable than this, that an unfeigned, 
practical, and implicit loyalty to that system of religion 
which Christ and his Apostles gave us — that, and nothing 
else is Christianity. 

Jesus Christ demands our allegiance to himself person- 
ally. Even one of the disciples of Socrates remarked that 
he perceived so much that was wise and excellent in all 
those sayings which he did understand, that he felt assured 
that those w^hich he did not were equally valuable. Beyond 
this, whether the Christian can see the reasonableness or not 
of the sayings and commands of the Saviour, he knows it 
is his duty to receive them as true, and obey them as 
divine — to own allegiance to Christ as the Eternal Word 
and the King of kings. The soldier on the field of battle 
does not stop to argue whether the orders of his general 
are wise, and much less if they will lead him out of danger, 
but carries out the prescribed system, and obeys with a 
high feeling of honor and allegiance. So the true Chris- 
tian carries out the Christian discipline as a system of life, 
and obeys Christ the great Captain of his salvation. 

Thus true baptism teaches men a holy jDcrsonal devoted- 
ness to that system of religion Avhich Christ and His Apostles 
gave, in distinction fi'om Roman Catholic views of Church 
authority on the one hand, and the cold moralities of a 
mere skeptical philosophy on the other. 

The importance of Christian baptism appears again in 
this, that it instructs each believer in the original and 
divinely appointed summary and confession of the Christian 
Faith. 



214 AN AGE OF KECONSTRUCTION. 

We live in an age remarkable for the formation, not so 
much of new sects, but of new parties that embrace the 
most vital portions of old denominations. And the sects, 
at present, will remain for the mechanical arrangements and 
organization of religions worship, but there are new gen- 
eral principles, new affinities, and repulsions now becoming 
far stronger than those of the creeds which marked the' 
distmctions of two hundred years ago, and so much more 
important are these becoming with the moving spirits of 
the age, that the merging of many sects is a mere question 
of time ; and the reconstruction of Christians on broader 
and more comprehensive prmciples, both of faith and char- 
ity than is recognized by mere sectarians, is inevitable. 

In the midst of this anarchy preceding reconstruction. 
Christian baj^tism, truly considered, is rendered mcreas- 
ingly important by every movement of the age ; as mstruct- 
ing each candidate into livmg views — and an ex animo con- 
fession of the fundamental principles of Christianity by 
baptizing them into the faith of the Father, and of the Son, 
and of the Holy Ghost. 

The commission inserts the creed of the Church, the 
rock upon which it was founded. And short as the words 
are, there is couched under these three mysterious names, 
as here used, all that is essential in Christianity ; so that 
every one who rightly and in his heart receives and em- 
braces them, has therein all the elements of the Christian 
religion, and is fit for Church membership ; while no one not 
thus receiving them is worthy. Mere assent to the words 
is nothing one way or the other, but the vital assent of the 
heart is the essence of Christianity. 

What is it, for mstance, to be baptized into the name of 
the Father ! and vdiy is this made the first requisite of the 



BAPTISMAL CREED THE FATHER. 215 

heavenly system ? Because as the reahzation of the Fatherly 
character of God is the greatest requisite of all true piety ; 
so the avowal of this realization by that living faith which 
gives alone vitality to all the teachings of natural religion, 
is made the first part of the Christian profession. When 
a man can lay his hand upon his heart and say, " ISTow I 
believe — now I feel that God is my Father and that I am 
His child — from Him I have derived a new and holy life — 
He has breathed into me the filial spirit — I commune wdth 
Him through prayer as my Great Father in heaven — I love 
and look up to Him, de|)ending on Him in all thmgs, and 
being governed by His will and pleasure supremely ; and I 
know that He loves and watches over me — that His Provi- 
dence is disciplining me, and His hand guiding all my 
affairs" — that man has rightly learned this first article of 
the Christian creed ; this portion of the great mystery of 
the Godhead. He believes in the doctrine of the Father. 
The wicked, the impenitent man can not say this, with 
truth ; no unregenerate man can. Even a bad man may 
adore the God of nature, may feel that he is a Great Being 
and a Powerful Being — yes, a terrible Being. He may be- 
lieve in him as the All-wise Creator, and love ingeniously 
to trace out the wonders of his works, he may conceive 
of him as Almighty, the Self-existing Jehovah, as the Ruler 
and Governor of men ; or even as their final Judge ; — but 
as the Father ? — No. 

Hence, St. John declares, no man knoweth the Father 
but the Son, and He to whom the Son shall reveal Him. 
''ISTo man," says Christ, "cometh to the Father but by 
me." "I am the way, the truth, and the Life." 

What is it then rightly to receive the doctrine of the 
Son ? Can it mean less than to believe that as ordinarily 



216 "the SOX." 

tlie Son partakes of the intrinsic and equal nature of the 
Father, even so T^ithin the man Christ Jesus there came 
do^m and tabernacled a full and comj^lete indwellhig of the 
Divine Xature ? — that he who was thus the brightness of 
the Father's glory, and the express image of His person, 
became at once the Kevealer of the Father and the Res- 
cuer of men ? To believe in the Son then embraces a re- 
Hance on the divine authority of all He said and did on 
earth for man's redemption ; the Son executing and acting 
out here those things of which the pattern existed in the 
eternal counsels of the Divine mind ; doing nothing of Him- 
self but what He thus saw in the bosom of the Father. The 
plan all prepared m Heaven — its working out committed to 
the Son on earth ; even as He says, " My Father worketh 
hitherto, and I work" — " I and my Father are one." To 
receive Christ, therefore, is (and herem Ues the great prac- 
tical efficiency of the doctrine), to receive all His work, all 
He said, all He did and sufiered as the authorized exposi- 
tion and carrymg out of the divine counsels in our behalf, 
and a reflection of the disj^osition of the full Deity toward 
each weary and heavy-laden sinner. 

When the EthiojDian eunuch sat in his chariot, and his 
faith was demanded by Philip, he rej^lied at once, " I be- 
lieve that Jesus is the Son of God." It was the most com- 
prehensive confession possible of all this — the essence of 
the whole Christian faith. 

When a man has thus, with all his soul, received Christ 
as the Son, when he can lay his hand upon his heart, and 
say, '*Xow I beheve m the Son of God — I receive Him as my 
Master, I acknowledge allegiance and obedience to Him 
as my Head and Kmg ; I hope for forgiveness and peace 
through Him as my Mediator and Priest ; I receive Him as 



"the holy ghost." 217 

my guide through life, His precepts to be my rule, His 
doctrines and revelations my faith — Himself as the great 
elder brother in whom the whole family are named, the 
Head of His body the Church ;" — that man hath both the 
Father and the Son. 

But " no man can say that Jesus is Lord but by the Holy 
Ghost." What is it, then, that a man professes to believe 
in being baptized in the name of the Holy Ghost ? Cer- 
tainly not less than that a Divine Spiritual Power operates 
consciously and directly upon his soul; and which he recog- 
nizes as distinct from all other impressions produced by the 
Father and the Son ; a power which enlightens and elevates 
him, makes dark things light and difficult duties easy, in- 
structs and keeps him in the way of holiness, gives him 
energy in feebleness, and comfort in sorrow ; causes him to 
know what he could not know without, to love what he 
hated, and to hate what he loved : a power which thus 
changes his nature, restoring the soul, in its ultimate and 
perfect sway, to its original image of God. 

"When a man can lay his hand upon his heart and say, I 
thus believe in the Holy Ghost : God's holy Spirit works 
with my spirit, teaches me to pray, causes me to love holiness 
and hate iniquity, with supreme affection has taught me to 
embrace Christ, and to love the Father ; when a man has 
an experimental faith thus in the Father, and in the Son, 
and in the Holy Ghost ; feels that these three are but One 
— one whole — one "name" — one in his own heart and expe- 
rience : then, and not till then, has he the elements of that 
Christian faith professed in being baptized hi the name of 
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. 

Who can estimate the importance of such teachings at 
such a time, both to enlarge Christian charity to the coni- 

10 



218 UNIYEKSALIST BAPTISM. 

prehension of all who credibly avow tlieir experience of 
tliese fandamental truths ; and as a conservative element, at 
the same time, to restrict the profession of Christianity to 
such. All the controversies now ao-itatino^ Christendom 
will give each year an increased prominence to the baptismal 
confession thns regarded. Christian baptism is more than 
mstruction, therefore, it is a personalpro/655^o?^of many vital 
truths. 

Several years ago, there was an extensive revival of re- 
ligion in an inland town of ^ew England, where the Uni- 
versalists were numerous and influential. Some who had 
belonged to that Society joined the Baptist Church, and 
many more, firm supporters of the system, were much 
shaken. At length their minister, who had heretofore for 
twelve years ever ridiculed the ordinances of religion in his 
sermons, altered his style of preaching, told his people 
that he was convinced of the propriety of Christian baptism, 
and of the importance of forming a JJniversaUst Churchy 
in\dting those of his congregation who desired, to unite 
with him in doing so. 

A few agreed to join, some desired sprinkling, some pour- 
ing, and some immersion ; and of those who chose the latter 
some preferred kneeling in the water, some at the water's 
edge. Another Universalist preacher came over from a 
neighboring town, first immersed the minister who resided 
there, after which they together administered what each 
desired, to the rest, and then formed them all into a professed 
Church. 

On the next Sabbath it was noticed that one of the prin- 
cipal Universalists of the town, and his wife, attended with 
the Baptists, and again on the following Sabbath. It was 
the first time for years that they had been seen in an evan- 



THE AWAKENING. 219 

gelical place of worship, and all were convinced that there 
must be some change in their views. The man had, years 
before, fitted up the whole of the second story of his house 
into one large ball-room, where nearly all the balls and 
public gatherings used to be held. It was the rendezvous 
of the opponents of evangelical religion, and he had ever 
been particularly bitter, ^or was it without some mis- 
givings that the Baptist minister, having resolved to visit 
him, fastened his horse at his gate. 

He at once gave this account of himself: " About two or 

three weeks ago I attended the baptism of Mr. , (the 

Universalist minister). I had heard him formerly ridicule 
that which he now quoted the I^ew Testament to prove 
true. This led me to observe it more carefully, and I be- 
came convmced that if baptism was right, universalism was all 
wrong, and if universalism was right, baptism was all wrong." 

"What led you to that opinion?" 

"Baptism," he replied, "seems intended to divide all 
men into two classes, the religious and the worldly. It 
draws a line between them. Universalism makes no such 
difference. It breaks down all the distinction." 

The minister asked which he intended to give up. 

He replied that he and his wife had been led by what 
they had witnessed, prayerfully to read the Bible ; that 
they had found singular light and strength through j)rayer, 
and had enjoyed the worship in which they had united, but 
wished to see more clearly before they decided. 

In the course of a few weeks they both professed an en- 
tire change, and in proper time applied for Christian bap- 
tism, desiring to consecrate the hall-room^ and open it for 
the worship of their Master, whenever there should be an 
opportunity. 



220 THE BAPTISMAL PKOFESSIOX. 

It was therefore arranged that on the follo^ving Sabbath 
evening, this room should be used for Divine service, pre- 
vious to the baptism. 

Within full view of the house rolled a clear and beautiful 
stream, which suited well for the ordinance. Seldom has 
baptism seemed so powerfully to preach the whole doctrines 
of evangelical religion, and show its own practical import- 
ance by the nature of the profession which it makes. A 
large multitude v>^as there of those who a short time before 
had ^^itnessed the same outward form used by a Universahst. 
But " without controversy" it professed and preached all 
the points of an evangelical faith and personal experience 
as no words of man could express them. It seemed devised 
to cut at the roots of the system of popular modern Uni- 
versalism, by its simple professions, as no mere argument 
could. It ap23eared as if made to utter just all of those 
truths that a Universahst might desu-e to proclaim in re- 
nouncing that system. 

It professed a " fleeing from the icrath to come^'^'' by per- 
sonal repentance.^ Redemption through the death and resur- 
rection of Christ ; ^ his o^vn regeneration or death to sin, and 
newness of heart and life,^ and his faith in future retribu- 
tions and hope of bemg finally raised from the dead to live 
with Him in glory.^ It is not as a matter of controversy, 
not as a sectional distinction, that Baptists love this ordi- 
nance, but as the most clear profession, the most eloquent 
preacher of those great truths which all real Christians 
desire to bind around their hearts, and unfold to the world 
as a banner, in their acts and Hves. 

^ Matthew, iii. 'Z, 8. ^ Colossians, ii. 12. 

^ Romans, vi 4-6. * 1 Corinthians, xv. 29. 



THE PLEDGES OF BAPTISM. 221 

§ III. The Pledges of Baptism. 

Baptism is not merely retrospective, but also prospective ; 
not only a profession of the past, but a promise and a pledge 
of things yet future, and hence its important bearing on the 
Christian to the very end of life. It binds him by solemn 
obligations, and sustains his faith by formal pledges. It is 
not necessary here to repeat what has been said on a former 
page, as to the increasing sense which is every where mani- 
festing itself of the value of the formal part of religion. 
Puseyism and Romanism prove this. The only question is, 
whether we shall have a series of forms and symbols teach- 
ing error or teaching truth ; those established by the Saviour 
of men, or those which sprung up out of the corruptions of 
after ages. 

The idea of many evangehcal Christians, that because 
good men differ about forms, therefore it is better to treat 
them all with indifference, makes as little account of human 
nature and experience, as it does of the Bible. 

On the part of the candidate, baptism is a promise to live 
a life of separation from the world, and consecration to 
Christ ; and in this its importance is felt. At the close of a 
passage before quoted, from the Epistle to the Romans, St. 
Paul speaking of the baptismal vow, says, " Let not sin, 
therefore reign in your mortal bodies that ye should obey it 
in the lusts thereof, neither yield ye your members as instru- 
ments of unrighteousness unto sin ; but yield yourselves 
unto God, as tliose who are alive from the dead, and your 
members as instruments of righteousness unto God." 

Thus the baptized are pledged to separation from a life 
of sin, dedicating themselves to a course of lioliness. Baptism 
is in this respect the most solenm thing on the face of the 



222 BAPTISM A EENU:N^CIATIO]Sr. 

earth. The believer in Christ here surrenders the world, 
and professes himself alive unto God. He here renounces, 
yea, as it were, buries in a liquid grave, the pomps and 
vanities ol the world — its pride, its ambition, its selfishness, 
its supreme and ruling attachment to the riches, and hon- 
ors, and pleasures of this life. He promises to be a fol- 
lower of the meek and humble Jesus, to obey his laws, to 
imitate his example, to be guided by his Spirit, to live, in 
fact, a life of holy love, courage and confession. Baptism 
is here placed at the threshold of the Christian course, as a 
pledge that the candidate will be ready to follow it up by 
a life spent in the confession of Christ in whatever way he 
requires. This duty, deriving its obligation from the will 
of the Saviour alone, being a positive, as distinct from a 
moral command, is well fitted to show that in all our ways, 
even of avowing Christ, we must be regulated by his will. 
The moment that any lose sight of this, they are much 
distressed to know just when and how to confess Christ, and 
when and where to stop. On the one hand, there is to be 
avoided the ostentatious sjDirit of a Jehu, who through 
policy and vain glory cried out " Come see my zeal for the 
Lord of Hosts," or the unbidden impetuosity of Peter, 
when he smote ofi* the ear of Malchus. But the cowardly 
spirit of apjDroaching Jesus but only m private; and as 
the " Teacher come from God," yet hke Mcodemus only 
venturing by night, for fear of the cross, this is also to be 
dreaded on the other hand. 

The child of grace here learns at the entrance of his 
course, that nothing is more necessary than to be ready 
cheerfully, openly, and daily, to avow his religious i^rinci- 
ples. And he also pledges himself to confess Christ through 
life, in the Saviour's own way ; to go so far as he has some 



A RECIPKOCAL PLEDGE. 223 

plain directions, and no further ; never to go back where 
there is a command to go forward, and never to go forAvard 
where he is not bidden. Such a principle heartily embraced 
and acted upon, at the outset, will save the Christian many 
sorrows and difficulties, conferring the elements of a manly 
and consistent piety. 

But the pledge is reciproeal. While the believer surren- 
ders himself to Christ in the waters of baptism, Christ in 
that ordinance pledges himself to the believer, yea to carry 
him through, who faithfully and earnestly engages in the 
Christian life, relying on his grace. Here he enters, as it 
were, into a public covenant with his Maker and Redeemer. 
He takes God for his j^ortion, who by authorizing him to 
do this, here pledges himself that neither death, nor hfe, 
nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor thmgs pres- 
ent, nor things to come shall separate him from His love. 
He who has known what it is truly to thirst after righteous- 
ness, will find here the voice of God saying to him, " Ho, 
every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters * * * 
and I will mal<^e an everlasting covenant loith you^ even the 
sure mercies of David." And when in after days his soul 
is cast down, and his heart is disquieted within him, he can 
remember and recur to the covenant thus publicly ratified 
by divine authority in the waters of his baptism, and his 
spirit will be refreshed while he says, " As the hart pantetli 
after the water-brooks so panteth my soul after Thee, oh 
God."' 

Indeed the final pledge given to the Christian in his bap- 

^ The whole of this beautiful Psalm (42 d) was sung, during some cen- 
turies, by the Christians, as they walked in procession to the baptistries, 
when a candidate was about to bo baptized. So also were parts of 
Isaiah, Iv. 



224 BAPTISM A PLEDGE 

tism is that Jesus will raise him u]3 at the last great day by 
the same spirit which raised up Christ from the dead, dwel- 
ling in him. Rom. viii. 11. It thus becomes the pledge to 
him of a resurrection to eternal life. 

There is a passage of Scripture not without its difficulties 
of mterpretation indeed, but which yet clearly shows that 
there is inspired authority for regarding the baptism of a 
behever a pledge of his glorious resurrection. It is in 1 
Cor. XV. 29, where St. Paul, arguing on this subject sud- 
denly asks, "Why are we then baptized for the dead, if the 
dead rise not, and why stand we in jeopardy every hour?" 
The Apostle may perhaps be regarded as referrmg to the 
case of those who presented themselves for baptism after 
the funerals of the martyrs, like fresh soldiers pressing for- 
ward in the assault in the room of those fallen on the field 
of battle. Such persons might be said to be baptized for, 
or in the room of the dead. And St. Paul might reasonably 
ask, why then are these thus baptized for the dead ? Why, 
when one rank of Christian soldiers is swept away by the 
sword of jDersecution, does another step forward and take 
its j^lace, except that m baptism they have symbohzed their 
faith in the resurrection, their hopes of thereby arrivmg at 
a better state of existence ? And why stand the rest in 
jeopardy of the same fate every hour ? But whatever 
precise interpretation we may give these words, it is clear 
that in baptism the Christian professes his faith in the resur- 
rection even on the principle upon which the Apostle argues, 
" if we have been planted together in the likeness of his 
death we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection." 

The fathers, therefore, received baptism as a pledge and 
symbol of the resurrection in its very mode. Chrysostom 
says, " our being baptized, even immersed in water, and our 



OF A GLOIIIOUS RESURKECTIOX, 225 

rising again out of it, is a Symbol of our descending into 
the grave, and our returning thence. Wherefore St. Paul 
calls baptism a burial. For he says we are buried ^\ith 
Christ by baptism unto death." ^ 

This Christian rite, then, is a pledge of the bright fu- 
ture life from him who liveth and was dead, and is alive for- 
ever more, and who has the keys of hell and death, who 
openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man 
openeth. It is a message direct from the Lamb that sitteth 
in the midst of the throne. " Be thou faithful unto death 
and I will give thee a crown of life." He says to each 
weak and trembling believer, " Struggle on but a little 
while, be humble m the midst of a proud world, be self- 
denying in the midst of the gay and luxurious, be prayer- 
ful amid the worldly, love when hated, bless when perse- 
cuted, be faithful for a little time, and as sure as thou art 
what thou here professest, I will come again and receive 
thee unto myself, that where I am thou mayest be also." 
Thus the Christian's baptism becomes to him a symbol, yet 
not a mere symbol, but a pledge from the Head of the 
Church, let down to him, as it were, by a golden thread 
from heaven ; a pledge and a foretaste of joys to come ; '' an 
earnest of his inheritance." 

And is it now asked by any, why is it important to 
preserve true and original baptism ? The reply is, be- 
cause each and all of these principles wliich it teaches, pro- 
fesses and pledges, are important ; it assures the candidate 
that all these things are not, as many would su2:)pose, interpo- 
lations into the Christian system ; they are realities, all en- 
grafted by Christ himself into the initiatory ordinance of 
his discipleship. 

^ Ohiys. Horn. 40, on 1 Cor. 
10* 



226 EFFECTS OF BAPTISM. 

In this view we may and ought to prize Christian baptism 
very highly. Xot as an act of merit ; not as a matter of 
controversy and of dispute. A holy mind will shrink from 
doing or saying any thing unnecessarily to wound the feel- 
ings of a sincere Christian, who may be weak and in ig- 
norance of his duty. But as a solemn act of spiritual wor- 
ship to the Father, Son and Holy Ghost ; as a most solemn 
part of authorized self-consecration ; as the most eloquent 
preacher of all the chief doctrmes of Christianity, we are 
obliged to love and prize this ordinance most highly. It is 
a grand conservator of those holy truths. It is the ark of 
the covenant, in which is deposited the autograph, not of 
the law, but of the Gospel. 



§ lY. Baptisi[ Impoetaxt for its Effects. 

The object of the present section is further to illustrate 
the importance of Christian baptism, from its effects on the 
w^orld, as the commencement of a hfe of open and avoioed 
IJiety, Every young Christian in turn probably asks this 
question. Why can not I as well be a follower of Christ 
mthout making a public ]3rofession of religion ? As it is 
not possible for him to understand all the reasons at the 
outset of his religious life, God has not left the matter ojd- 
tional, but seen fit to rest it upon his oyn\ positive institu- 
tion, and attached to it a degree of importance which, in 
the present day, it is too much the custom to disparage. 

The history of an avowed piety is one that begins very 
early in that of our race, and long before the flood. ISTo 
sooner was the tlimily of Seth, the son of Adam, estabUshed 
in the earth, than we read, according to our present version. 



SEPAKATIOK. 227 

that " then began men to call upon the name of the Lord."^ 
This can not mean that now, for the first time, men began 
to pray to God. Adam and Eve Avorshiped Him both be- 
fore and after the expulsion from Eden. Cain and Abel 
both sacrificed to Him; and Seth was probably a pious 
man. Without examining other conjectures, the marginal 
reading appears to give the probable sense of the passage, 
" Then began men to call themselves hy the name of the 
LordP That is to say, in the time of Enos, the grandson 
of Adam, the descendants of Cain had probably become so 
wicked that it was necessary to make a broad line of de- 
markation between those who served Jehovah and those 
who served him not. At this period pious men first began 
to separate themselves openly from the wicked, and to avow 
a distinctive religion. In the same spirit, Moses, at a later 
period, says to the children of Israel, " Thou hast avouched 
this day the Lord to be thy God."^ And thus Isaiah pro- 
phecies, " One shall say I am the Lord's, and another shall 
call himself by the name of Jacob, and another shall sub- 
scribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surname himself 
by the name of Israel."^ 

God has always had a seed to serve him. Long before 
the event recorded in Genesis, there were men of personal 
and practical holiness, but not of the same conspicuous and 
avowed piety as henceforth. The wickedness of the wicked 
made their religion stand forth more conspicuously, and 
made them feel the necessity of a more bold, active, agress- 
ive piety than heretofore, hence they " called themselves 
by the name of the Lord." Accordingly, in Genesis, vi. 3, 
we find them known as " the sons of God." 

Here, then, commenced the distinction between the Church 
^ Genesis, iv. 26. 2 Deuteronomy, xxvi. V\. ^ Isaiali, xliv. 5. 



228 DAIS^IEL'S OPEN WINDOW. 

and the world; and just in proportion as it has been kept 
up, religion has ever prospered, while by so much as it has 
been relaxed, religion has degenerated and lost its power 
over the hearts and consciences of mankind. 

We are not now, however, gomg to discuss' the state of 
the world and of the Church as they Avere five thousand 
years ago. We have to speak of them as they are noio^ to 
shovv^ the miportance oi open piety — the necessity of avow- 
ing our religion so far as it goes, and of calling ourselves by 
the name of the Lord. It is probable that every emotion 
of the mind has its natural and appropriate expression in 
some corresponding motion of the body. And our actions 
are becoming, in proportion as they are the natural or 
divinely-appointed expressions of some proper emotion of 
the mind. If the Spirit truly worketh within us, it is to will 
and to do the good pleasure of our Heavenly Father. 

There are certain natural exhibitions of piety, to repress 
which is highly injurious to the religious character. When 
Daniel knew that the writino- was simed, consisfnins; to the 
den of lions whosoever worshijDed God for thirty days, he 
prayed as aforetime^ with his windoAv oj)en, three times 
daily. To have opened that ^^indow, if he had been accus- 
tomed to have it shut, would have been ostentation, but to 
have closed it for fear of the king's decree, or of the lion's 
den, would have been denying his God. His consistency, 
perhaps his salvation, turned upon leaving that window 
open at that time. 

" Ye are the light of the world," said the Saviour ; " a 
city that is set on a hill can not be hid." It is in the nature 
of light to shine, and to throw its bright and glittering rays 
far and mde over creation, and it is a law of God that we 
may not fetter this difi*usive tendency, may not light a 



THE LIGHT-HOUSE. 229 

candle to put it under a bushel. If we make the attempt, 
the light will soon exhaust the air mthin, and thus extin- 
guish itself. If Christ has kindled a flame of grace in our 
hearts, however feeble, all artificial efforts to conceal it are 
wrong. That light might otherwise shine over the dark 
waters of the sea of life, and perchance keep others from 
the rocks and breakers which are on every side of a reli- 
gious course. All unnatural effort to repress the flame of 
piety is a wrong done to the Church and to the world. 

Christians are like light-houses along a rock-bound coast. 
What should we think of the keeper of one of these beacons, 
who was too modest to make his habitation known by 
kindling up his lantern on some stormy night ? He might 
not hear the gurgling sound of the vessels as they sank like 
lead in the mighty waters. Tliey might not strike against 
his light-house. He might not perceive the shriek and last, 
loud wail of mortal agony, as men were in their death 
struggle. But would he be the less answerable for not liaA^- 
ino: let his lio;ht shine ? Or if it were a revolvino^ lio-ht, off 
the mouth of some harbor, where the bright home of many 
a storm-tossed mariner awaited him, and the keeper only 
neglected to Avind the machinery, so that it blazed not up 
at the apj)ointed moment, who can tell the perils into which 
thousands, saiUng by those lights, would be thrown in a 
sino^le nisfht ? 

Christians are the keepers of these light-houses. They 
are the light of the world, l^o man can tell the effect of a 
single suppression of the soul's great message to mankind. 
Not until the thrones are set, and the dead, small and great, 
stand before God ; not until " the sea shall give up the dead 
that are in it," shall all the consequences of suppressing light 
be manifest. 



230 EFFECTS OX TIMID CHEISTIAXS. 

That sea ! it is navigated by millions, crossed by all in 
tlie great voyage of human life, sliips are foundering on it 
in every gale, and shoals and breakers are all around. But 
yonder lies the harbor, and there stands the light-house — the 
Church of the living God, round which the hopes of a thou- 
sand spiritual mariners are cUnging, and to which each eye is 
directed. Suddenly the light gets out of order — it revolves 
no longer ; its rays are dim when they should be clear and 
bright. The mariner stands in doubt, and fears to venture ; 
the light is not such as is laid down in liis chart ; he deems 
it safer to ride out the tempest at sea. Or, while he hesi- 
tates, the light goes out, and he has missed its bearmgs ; he 
strikes a rock. Is there no responsibility here ? But the 
keeper is only asleep j^^i'haps, when he should have been 
awake, he only does not let his light shine. 

One of the earliest and most universally extended temj^t- 
ations of the young Christian, is to suppress the natural 
and appropriate expression of the religious emotions. But 
what does it really amount to ? Just tliis : smothering tlie 
cries of an mfant, by which it makes known its existence, 
and its want of care and nutrition. Many young Chris- 
tians, from a fear of forwardness, and self-deception, and 
future inconsistency, stifle every natural and spontaneous 
exhibition of their religious wants and emotions, the anxie- 
ties and experiences of their souls, m the great struggle 
after the unseen mysteries of spiritual life ; until by stifling 
the exjDression, they lose the ability to express, and soon 
the disposition to act, and the power to feel. It is as if one 
should put an extmguisher on a lamjD, lest the wind should 
blow it out. 

Such persons mil point to the many who have j^rofessed 
and boasted ; — who, like the foolish vii'gins, have gone forth 



EDDYSTONE LIGHT-HOUSE. 231 

with the lamp of a profession, but without the oil and fire 
of grace. They refer to these failures, and ask how they 
shall venture to erect their light, even on the Rock of ages, 
when so many have failed. 

There stands upon the coast of England, near Plymouth 
Harbor, the celebrated Eddystone Light-house. About 
one hundred and twenty years ago, an engineei' of distin- 
guished ability, erected a fabric there, ri^^eted so firmly to 
the rocks by iron elects, that he was heard boastmgly to 
say, that he only wished he might be in it when the fiercest 
storm that ever raged under heaven was blowing. After 
many years, he was on a visit to the building in 1745, dur- 
ing one of the severest gales on record. And in a dark 
night, while many a sailor was tossing upon the sea, the 
light was observed to be extinguished; and when the storm 
cleared up, light-house, keeper, architect, all were found to 
have been swept away, not a vestige Avas left, the very 
iron having been torn from its riveted foundations in the 
rock. 

The jDresent light-house, which has stood ever since, was 
then erected on the same spot ; over the entrance to which, 
the new architect modestly and piously inscribed these 
words : " Except the Lord build the house, they labor in 
vain who build it." And there it stands to this day. 

Christian baptism, nailing up tins talismanic sentence 
over the door of each heart, while it boldly erects its light 
to the world, becomes divinely protected and preserved in 
doing so, amid all the storms and tempests of life. 

Every one of us has some circle of influence. Our 
avowal of the Saviour is the most efficient way of inducing 
others to take refuge in Cln-ist. Multitudes are constantly 
led to him throilgh the experience of those aromid them, 



232 IXDIYIDUAL NEGLECTS MULTIPLIED. 

and his fame and liis glory is thus spread more in the earth 
than in any other way. Our avowal of gi-atitude may 
bring thousands of others ultimately to glorify Him to all 
eternity. "What should we think of a poor man cured gra- 
tuitously of some desperate disease, who refused to ac- 
knowledo'e that he ever had been sick, or restored by the 
23hysician, saying that the cure of so bad a case could bring- 
no reno^m to any one ? 

TThat might seem slight neglect m an individual case, 
multiphed by the thousands and tens of thousands of the 
spiritual Israel, mounts up in each age to a mighty robbery 
of the great Iling of Zion, defrauduig him of vast revenues 
of glory. 

Were all those who consider themselves truly pious, to 
bring their full and proj^er meed of praise, and honor, and 
glory to the Lamb, by a public and constant confession of 
Him before men, in every appointed way, it would make 
this earth resound with hallelujahs and ring with the j^raise 
of Immanuel. It would bring such a tribute of renoT\Ti 
and thanksgivmg as to j^roduce the greatest awakening, 
both of saints and of sinners, the world has ever seen. 
And these cases would bring others and others in each suc- 
cessive generation. But what wonder if the great Head 
of the Church T\ithhold his Spirit and his presence — what 
wonder if the world be so neglectful of religion, and the 
Church so cold, while Jesus is robbed and defrauded of his 
o^m glory, as He is daily in the house of those of aU of 
us, in this age, who consider ourselves his friends ? 



INFANT BAPTISM PROYED INJUKIOUS. 233 



OHAPTEE III. 

INT ANT BAPTISM PKOYED INJURIOUS BY THE CONCESSIONS OF 
ITS RECENT DEFENDERS. 

Some years ago several students were being examined in 
Systematic Theology, in a Theological Seminary, in which, 
though itself Pedobaptist, young men of different denomi- 
nations were educated, and in which there was much Chris- 
tian liberality both of sentiment and expression. 

"Who are the proper subjects for baptism?" was one of 
the questions asked. 

A student replied, " BelicYcrs, and it has generally been 
the opinion of the Church, that their infants are entitled to 
the same priYilege." 

" And pray, sir, what is your own opinion on the sub- 
ject?" 

" I have not been able to satisfy myself that it was a 
Scriptural practice." He then explained that although he 
did not belicYe infant baptism to be a BibUcal institution, 
yet he thought it a touching and beautiful rite, well calcu- 
lated to lead parents to recognize their religious duties to 
their children, and dedicate them solemnly to God. 

This is in substance the view now entertained in regard 
to this ordinance by a large number of tlie most enhglit- 
ened l^edoba])tist divines in this country — by the Organ 
of the Free Presbyterian Church in Scotland — by such men 
as Coleridge was in England, by Bunsen, Neander, and the 
great body of men of the highest claims to learning and 



234 COLERIDGE'S IDEA 

piety in Germany. This is, in fact, the ground-work of 
most modern defenses of the system, and as such, demands 
our present attention — itself indicating great progress, while 
rendermg the ultimate abandonment of the system inevit- 
able. 

§ I. Coleridge's Defense of Infant Baptism. 

We begin with one whose varied learnmg and profound 
reasoning powers have given his thoughts, fragmentary and 
almost contradictory as they often were, and generally ob- 
scurely expressed, so much weight with all deep thinkers 
on religious subjects. 

Coleridge, as we have before seen, concedes freely that 
" there exists no sufficient proofs that the baptism of in- 
fants was the practice of the Apostolic age," and that he 
"honors the course of those who reject it, as most scrip- 
tural." Yet he argues in favor of infant baptism, on such 
grounds as the following : 

" Where a ceremony answered and was intended to an- 
swer several i^urposes, which at its first institution were 
blended in respect of the time, but which afterward by 
change of circumstances were necessarily disunited, then 
either the Church hath no power or authority delegated to 
her, or she must be authorized to choose and determine to 
which of the several purposes the ceremony should be at- 
tached." And he asks boldly, " in what manner the Church 
could have exercised a sound discretion more wisely and 
effectively than it has done." ^ 

Such a defense as this is surely more alarming and in- 
jurious than infant baptism itself For so long as Scripture 
was quoted to maintain it, however erroneously, a tribute 

1 Aids to Reflection — ^Baptism. 



OF A ''discretionary POWER." 235 

of respect was at least paid to its supremacy, while here in- 
fant baptism is made to rest upon the " discretionary- 
authority" of the Church. 

The whole plausibility of this argument lies in taking for 
granted a " change of circumstances" which has no exist- 
ence. But the real point is not whether the Church has 
made a wise or unwise use of its authority, but whether it 
possesses any power at all to make such an alteration. This 
is the true question at issue. The visible churches of Christ 
are simply executive bodies, not legislative. Their duty is 
to carry out the laws of Christ, not to make laws of their 
own ; to exhibit in living operation that system of religion 
which Jesus Christ and His inspired Apostles left us, but not 
to alter or amend it at pleasure. If any set of men in the 
name of a Church, undertake to improve upon Christianity, 
to repeal its most fundamental laws, and alter the whole 
nature of its membership; they may make an agglom- 
eration of the superstitious philosophies and opinions of all 
subsequent ages, upon a small basis, perhaps of Christianity 
as a germ. This concedes in full the principle of all that 
the Church of Rome has ever asserted. It is certain that 
at the Reformation, none of the Churches that then arose 
could have stood a moment, had they admitted this openly. 
The right here claimed is not only a legislative but a funda- 
mental — a constitutional power, an authority to overthrow 
the original construction of Christ's visible church, and to 
create an institution fundamentally different. For if bap- 
tism is the door of visible Church membership, the admis- 
sion ^ all infants for life to a society originally composed 
only of penitent believers, is one of the most radical alter- 
ations conceivable. The whole terms of membership are 
changed. It is a coup d'^etat of the most sweeping kind, 



236 WHAT IS "the church?" 

flooding and altering the whole course of operative power. 
Part of the effects may be obviated where these persons 
are arbitrarily excluded until they are converted as they 
sometimes virtually are, but the principle of deviation at 
T^ill is estabhshed. But in the vast majority of cases, those 
thus admitted become its members and officers, often ob- 
tammg the complete control, as in all National EstabUsh- 
ments. 

Another question arises here. What is this body which 
it is uro'ed has thus the rio^ht to chansre the terms of Church 
membership so radically ? The word Church, exxhjo'nt^ it is 
generally conceded, is used in the Xew Testament ecclesias- 
tically m two senses, and but two/ 1. A particular visible 
Church or body of Christians in the habit of assembhng to- 
gether for worship, and walking in the doctrines and ordi- 
nances of the Gospel/ 2. The Church miiversal, consist- 
ing of all those whose names are written in heaven/ 

IN'ow if the authority to make this alteration were lodged 
any where, it would be m the universal Church, according 
to Mr. Coleridge. But then this Church consists not al- 
ways of those who j^rofess religion, but of all those who 
possess it, whether tliey are baptized or not. The dying 
tliief was a member of no visible Church, but was not he a 
member of Christ's mystical body, seeing that our Saviour 
said, " To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise ?" All true 
Christians are members of this body, the saints in heaven 
as well as those on earth. Christ its Head is in heaven, 
and its members will all assemble at the Marriage-supper of 
the Lamb, but never till then. The idea of one onlyi^rue, 
visible, universal Church on earth, is a fiction early invented 

^ See Robinson's Lexicon, eKK?.7](jca, (b.) 

^ GaL i. 2, Rev. i. 20, iii. 22. ■ ' Heb. xii. 23, Eph. i. 22, iu. 10. 



HOW IT WAS CHANGED. 237 

to crusli out supposed heretics, and naturally and necessarily 
resolving itself into Popery. 

Besides, if " the Church" possess this fundamental pow- 
er to alter its own constitution, where is the proof that it 
has ever so exercised it. If the masses of Christians ever 
consented to the change, it was not with their eyes oj)en, 
publicly and fairly. It was through false pretenses of Scrip' 
tural authority, through the force and usurpation of spirit- 
ual rulers ; a fraud violating the whole procedure. For it 
was, before it became common, falsely professed to have 
been derived from apostolic tradition, or from the authority 
of circumcision, and above all from the necessity of its re- 
generating efficacy to ^Drocure salvation. Even now it could 
not stand with evangelical Christians, except upon a suppo- 
sition, by the masses, of its Scriptural authority. We 
should soon find, universally, that if the Church had power 
to alter it one way, they had power and discretion too to 
alter it back again. 

But, in fact, this whole appeal to " the Church" is as if 
the President of a Bank should, at the annual meeting of 
its shareholders, decide that every bill-holder had a right 
to vote, and then take advantage of a resolution passed by 
the body composed of both these classes to prove that his 
decision was correct. The natural result of such an exten- 
sion of the controlling power to a large number of those 
who haa little real interest in its management, would be the 
practical reversion of it back into the more entire charge 
of the officers. This was, too, the immediate effiact of infant 
baptism. 

But let us suppose further that such a meeting should em- 
power the directors, president and casliier to make any 
other alteration they saw best, and henceforth fill all vacan- 



238 A FRAUD LEADING TO POPERY. 

cies, and be self-perpetuating with the whole legal powers 
of the bank. Would that render the transaction valid ? 
And if, while acting under these quasi powers, the property 
were squandered by folly or by fraud, would not the real 
shareholders have a right to step in, resume the election of 
their own officers, and proclaim all measures carried through 
the admission of improper persons to the corporate powers 
of the body, liable to be invalidated ? This is precisely the 
manner in which the name of " the Church" has been mis- 
used, and its authority prostituted. Under the plea of exer- 
cising " a sound discretion wisely and effectually," the ^diole 
terms of Church membership have been radically altered 
through infant baptism, and then the appeal is made to the 
body thus altered, to prove both its own authority and its 
consent. First by a baptism, witliout any profession of faith, 
vast herds of the unregenerate are for centuries accounted 
members of the Church. Unfit to manage these concerns 
themselves, all the power naturally falls into the hands of 
the clergy, whether with or without the consent of the 
masses matters little. The whole affair is radically opposed 
in principle to the nature of the Church estabhshed by 
Christ and his Apostles. 

So palpably is what is commonly called " the Church" but 
a fiction, in all, excepting the earlier centuries of ecclesi- 
astical history, that it means really not the people, but the 
priests ; not the body, but the officers ; until the wlroe sys- 
tem culminates naturally in a center — the Pope. 

But if it be said that each of the true visible ChiircTfes 
of Christ have this power of altermg their own constitu- 
tions at any time, which is the only possible Protestant 
ground, then each being independent, can not, by its action, 
bind any other. It would amount to this, therefore, that 



CHURCHES DIVIKELY HECO GI^TIZED . 239 

eyery particular Church is a perfectly voluntary society, 
icitJiout even the "inost fundcmiental principle of me7nher- 
siiip or organization laid doion in the New Testament im- 
cdterahly^ having not a single necessary feature of perma- 
nent identity. The ISTew Testament represents each one of 
those Churches scattered over the face of the whole globe, 
as being built up of " lively stones a spiritual house, a holy 
priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices to God." We find 
in the book of Kevelations, Christ representing himself as 
walking in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, and 
declaring that the candlesticks represent his Churches. On 
these and other representations of Scripture we have all 
been taught that they are divine institutions to which 
Christ has promised his presence to the end of time. 

But if now these bodies claim a right to alter this con- 
stitution, and instead of a spiritual house built of lively 
stones, whole nations may be swept into them without per- 
sonal piety, the next question is, does this promise of the 
presence of Jesus Christ extend to all such institutions ? 
Their constitutions may be made or altered by some liber- 
tine monarch, Hke Henry VIII., or by delegates who 
agree upon a certain platform, and amend and alter it at 
their pleasure. They may all of them call themselves 
Churches, they may have a succession of ministers if they 
see fit, but the question now is much more fundamental, 
have they adhered sufiiciently to the original constitution 
to be considered as Christian Churches at all ? Jesus 
Christ will not extend his presence and recognition to every 
thing that calls itself by that name, and allow an unlimited 
" discretionary power" as to its most fundamental provis- 
ions. The best that can be looked for is that He will per- 
haps also exercise a discretionary power ; Avhile it is cer- 



240 coxsTiTUTio:^' of the 

tain that the whole procedure must be regarded as utterly 
unauthorized. 

If now we take up a work by a distinguished clergyman 
of the Church of England (the author of "The Seven Lamps 
of Architecture"), we shall find him writing as follows, 
about the constitution of his o^vn ecclesiastical body : " It 
has been ingeniously endeavored to make baptism a sign 
of admission into the visible Church, but absurdly enough, 
for we know that half the baptized people in the world are 
very visible rogues, believmg neither in God nor devil, and 
it is flat hlasj^hemy to call them visible Christians." And 
yet if we ask Mr. Coleridge by wliat right infant baptism 
has been introduced to effect this radical alteration in the 
constitution of his Church, in reply, he says, " I ask with 
confidence in what way could the Church have exercised a 
sound discretion more msely, piously, and effectively." ^ 

We may perhaps be told that all this is the result, not of 
infant baptism, but of Church and State, and if we turn to 
the Episcopalians in this country, we shall unquestionably 
find a great improvement. But still, in " The New York 
Churchman" will be found an article written a short time 
ago, entitled, " Rights of the Laity." Speaking of these, 
the author says ; 

" What are their rights ? I take this diocese as an ex- 
ample. Connection of the loosest kind gives a layman, no 
matter what may be his opinions, and I am sorry to say 
hardly any matter what may be his moral and religious 
character, a right to vote for wardens and vestrymen, and 
a right to be a warden or vestryman. Every such person 
is eligible to membership of the Diocesan or General Con- 
vention, to a seat in the Diocesan, standing committee, and 
^ On Baptism, Aids to Reflection. 



EPISCOPAL CIIUKCII. 241 

every appointment in the gift of either Convention. These 
rights are secured by constitutions and canons, which can 
not be altered without the consent of the laity." Such are 
some of the results of " this sound discretion, wisely, pi- 
ously, and effectually exercised." 

On the other hand, the essential principle of Church con- 
stitution with the Baptists, is the admission only of persons 
baptized, upon a credible profession of faith in Jesus Christ, 
in the habit of assembling for worship and ordinances. 
This is, we have seen, identically that of the primitive 
churches — the bodies to which Christ promised his presence 
and blessing to the end of time. And when Coleridge, 
himself, " inclines to this view as the more ScrijDtural, ^ and 
Neander and Augusti are certain of it, can it be said that 
infant baptism is not injurious as well as erroneous ? 

But the question is not merely whether any Church has, 
or has not exercised her discretionary power wisely and pi- 
ously. It is something far more grave, even whether she 
has any discretionary power at all like that claimed, to make 
and unmake constitutions, and whether the usurpation of 
such a power is not injurious ? 

This is one of the most important of all questions, because, 
in fact, it bears most directly upon the Divine authority of 
Jesus Christ and his Apostles, to institute a form of organi- 
zation beyond the control and authority of after ages ; to 
institute a permanent visible body of Christians, Pedor 
baptism thus maintained, says in effect, that Christians now 
are just as wise, and have as much power to alter things, as 
Christ had to establish them. And this, whih^ it may seem 
at first view to be merely an exaggerated claim of Christ's 
presence, or an undue exaltation of the Cliurch authority, 

^ Works, Vol. V. p. 542. Notes on Robinson. 
11 



242 PURPOSES AT FIRST BLENDED. 

whicli were bad enougli, is yet so much worse as this, that 
it is in fact a lowering doAvn of the Divine authority, of the 
work of Christ and his Apostles. It is a denial of the per- 
manent character of all Divine institutions. It says in ef- 
fect, and Bunsen almost says it in words, " true we are poor 
fallible creatures, nevertheless, by the lights of experience 
and Church history, we are able in this age of reconstruc- 
tion to fashion a constitution not merely for the ideal Church 
of the future, but for the actual Church of the present, that 
shall be an improvement upon the original." Covered up 
in words that deceive even those who use them, this is the 
real point which is now ultimately involved in the theory 
of these modern advocates of infant baptism, on the ground 
of a discretionary power. All who attentively consider 
Coleridge's ideas, and those which haA^e been in Germany 
at the root of this whole argument, will perceive that these 
are not merely theoretic inferences, but most practical and 
vital fxcts. The tendency of the whole is beyond what its 
authors perceive, to diminish the supreme authority and 
Divine perfection of original Christianity, so far as the form- 
ation of a church is concerned, and by a theory of develop- 
ment, cautiously let down this religion to rest upon a found- 
ation of naturalism in place of super-naturalism. 

True, the entering wedge is here inserted by the feather 
end. It is supjDosed that baptism was " originally intended 
to answer several purposes, which purposes at its first insti- 
tution were blended in respect of time, but which afterward 
by change of circumstance, were necessarily disunited, as 
when for instance a large and ever-increasing proportion of 
the Christian Church, or those who at least bore the Chris-» 
tian name, were of Christian parents." 

Was baptism then designed to answer several purposes at 



HOW disu:n"ited. 243 

first blended in point of time, but afterward disunited ? 
The supposition is happily baseless. If true, it would re- 
flect upon the prescience of the founder of Christianity. 
There Avere surely just as large a j)roportion of children 
belonging to the first Christians as there are belonging to 
Christians now. There is no change of circumstance in 
that particular. True, they were not then considered fit 
to become members of the visible Church, or in this 
sense to " bear the Christian name." Yet that being the 
effect of the introduction of infant baptism could not be the 
cause of it. But those baptized seem to have been even 
chiefly heads of families, and tlierefore as large, if not a 
larger proportion of children were then connected with 
Christianity by family ties, than later. ISTor did it originally 
matter, so far as Church membership was concerned, whose 
children they were, for until they became truly pious, they 
were never baptized. All, whether descended from Chris- 
tian parents or heathen, were then baptized in the same 
way, and on the same principles. There was, and could be 
no change affecting the object of this ordinance. 

But Coleridge proceeds : " One purpose of baptism was 
the making it publicly manifest, first, what individuals were 
to be regarded by the world as belonging to the visible 
communion of Christians. Secondly, to point out for the 
Church itself those that were entitled to that especial dear- 
ness, that watchful disciplinary love and loving-ldndness, 
which, over and above tlie duties of philantliropy and uni- 
versal charity, Christ himself has enjoined in tlie new com- 
mandment." 

If we should admit all this, what has it to do with llie 
question? If the children of believers were to be baptized 
as entitled to this '' especial dearnes^" and disciplinary Iovq 



244 COLEFvIDGES- VIEW. 

of the Church, at the end of two hundi'ed years ; they 
ought to have been so received at first. Xothuig is more 
injurious to Christianity than by baptism pubhcly to dechire 
to the TTorkl, that a chikl belongs to the visible communion 
of Christians, because his flither is a pious man, if he turn 
out a reprobate. And so also, wliile the children of Chris- 
tians are entitled to that especial clearness and watchful 
disciphnary love which belong to them as children of pious 
parents, yet they are not entitledJ;o be loved even by their 
parents as Cnristians^ until they are such, and manifest the 
sensible experiences of the new life. And so in regard to 
the relations they sustain to all other bemgs, whether 
equals, instructors, or pastors. There is in all this, no 
changre of circumstances at all aftectmg: the orduiance, even 
if the parental relation had not existed m the days of the 
Apostles, as it does now. The history of Christ blessing 
the infants is so recorded as to leave no room for the sup- 
position that they were baptized. There must have been 
vast multitudes of the children of believing parents ^ in the 
first ages. The neglect to baptize them then, and the insti- 
tution of such terms as they could not j^ossibly comply 
with, was a clear decision against their admissibihty, mitil 
they became Christians by choice. So that infant baptism 
is even in direct opposition to the authority of our Sa\iour. 
A further reason advanced is the most remarkable of all. 
Coleridge would have us combine ^T.th the above, " the ne- 
cessity of checking the superstitious abuse of the bai^tismal 
rite ;" that is, " the imj^ortance of j^reventing the ceremony 
from being regarded as other and more than a mere cere- 
mony." Who does not know, that as infant baptism was 
never current until it was supposed to be necessary to sab 
1 1 Cor. vii. 14. 



INTOLERABLE VIEW OF GOD. 245 

vation, so it became the great evidence, witness, and proof, 
to after ages, of this the most gigantic error of corrupt re- 
hgion? It is difficult to conceive how Coleridge could 
have been quite sincere in penning a sentiment such as this, 
for in his " IsTotes on Jeremy Taylor," he says : 

" N^ow this is the strongest argument of all against in- 
fant baptism, and that which alone weighed at one time 
with me ; namely, that it sripposes and most certainly en- 
courages a belief concerning a God the most hlaspJiernoiis 
and intolerahle^^ even that the want of it may occasion 
their " eternal loss." ^ Keander not only sustains this, but 
says, alluding to the time when infant baptism began to be 
advocated, that " now "^ * * the error became more lirmly 
established, that without external baptism no one could be 
delivered from inherent guilt, or raised to eternal life, and 
when the notion of a magical influence or cliarm connected 
Avith the sacraments, continually gained ground, the theory 
was finally evolved, of the unconditional necessity of infant 
baptism." Certainly nothing so favored the idea of " a 
magical influence or charm" connected with the sacraments ; 
nothing so naturally and inevitably caused this notion to 
gain ground, as that very administration of baptism to in- 
fants, which Coleridge declares was piously and wisely intro- 
duced from its obvious tendency to have the opposite 
effect ! He does indeed admit that, by an '' unforeseen 
accident," wormwood was " afterward cast into the sweet 
waters of this fountain, and made them like the waters of 
Marah, too bitter to be drank." But he does not admit 
half their native bitterness, as it ought to be admitted, 
and they certainly have been i)retty extensively drank, 
however bitter, until within tlie last hundred years. 
*^ Works, vol. V. p. 192. Harper. 



246 DE. BUSHNELL. 

§ II. Dr. Bushnell's Yiews of Infant Baptism. 

In the year 1847, the Massachusetts Sabbath School So- 
ciety pubhshed two " Discourses on Christian Nurture," by 
Dr. BushnelL They contained what was considered quite 
an original hne of argument in favor of infant baptism, and 
were read first of all before the Hartford Association, 
which body requested the author to jDublish them. After 
this, they were submitted to the Executive Committee of the 
above Society, read by every member, and re-read until the 
paper was considerably worn ; corrected verbally by the 
author, at their request, and, approved, sanctioned, and en- 
dorsed by them, were finally published by the Society. 

A Baptist newspaper in Boston first called attention to 
the remarkable character of this little work, as a defense 
of infant baptism at the expense of evangelical principles. 
Dr. Tyler, the senior Professor of a neighboring Congrega- 
tional Theological Seminary, after a time, wrote a review 
of it, declaring it full of " dangerous tendencies ;" and at 
last the Society itself, without retracting any thing, resolved 
" to suspend the sale of it, without publicity." This in- 
duced Dr. Bushnell to publish " An Argument in favor of 
the Discourses," etc., which finally he republished with the 
discourses themselves. 

Dr. Bushnell's want of controversial tact has no doubt 
much hindered the spread of his theory, for in vindicating 
himself from the charge of heresy, he assumes positions and 
produces arguments even more ofiensive to his opponents 
than the point he wishes to prove. His system, too, has 
carried him far, very far ; for the deeply logical structure 
of his mind, and the frankness of his character, have led 
him to avoid all shirkmg of legitimate consequences. But 



NO SETTLED THEOKY. 247 

this is, in its essence, the mildest and most moderate theory 
of infant baptism ever exhibited; the least offensive to 
others, the most simple, and consistent mth itself. If it 
will not stand, nothing will. Dr. Tyler's letter in reply to 
it, is but an argument for Baptist principles from beginning 
to end. 

Dr. Bushnell, indeed, has, beyond any other writer on 
this subject, resolved infant baptism back into the principles 
on which it essentially rests. He has even attempted to do 
the same in regard to the views of their opponents, thus 
enabling us to contrast, with the greatest accuracy, Pedo- 
baptist and Baptist theories of Church membership. 

There are several valuable concessions brought out in 
these writings, most important as arising from discourses 
originally intended against the Baptists, and yet made the 
more freely, from the fact that, after the first publication, 
Dr. Bushnell's particular opponent was himself a Pedobap- 
tist. Thus, for instance, it was admitted that " no settled 
opinion on the subject of infant baptism and of Christian 
nurture has ever been attained to. Between the standard 
Protestant writers themselves there has been no agreement. 
What is the covenant ? What meaning and force has it ? 
Here we have never agreed, and do not now. The Baptists 
have pushed us for an answer, we have given them many 
answers, but never a7iy single answer in lohich loe could 
agree among our selves. '^'^^ 

He even shows that Dr. Hopkins insisted on " the essen- 
tial absurdity oi m^-^iTit baptism as commonly practiced," ^ 
and says, '' There is little reason to wonder that the Bap- 
tists should reject infant baptism when we hold it ourselves 

^ Views of Christian Nurture and Subjects Adjacent thereto, pp. 56-61. 
^ PaRO 71. 



248 EVANGELICAL CHURCHES. 

only as a dead tradition, separated from any rational mean- 
ing or use. And if we stand npon the footing of absolute 
individualism, it follows irresistibly, as any child may see, 
that they are right in requiring evidence of actual faith* 
previous to baptism/ He admits that they have all been 
holding mfant baptism as an empty tradition, a form, the 
soul of which is evaporated and lost, giving its rejectors the 
strongest argument possible against it. And he approraigly 
quotes Dr. ISTevins as declaring, in despair and horror, that 
the evano'elical Puritanism of Xew Eno-land " has made us 
all Baptists in theory^ lohich is the same as to say that toe 
oiigh^o he so in fact, ^'''^ We have long believed all that 
is here stated ; that the Congregational Churches of Xew 
England, by just so much as they differ from the old Uni- 
tarian Churches, and the Presbyterian Churches, since the 
time of Tennant, were so far "Baptist in theory;" and on 
this groimd it is that Baptists have felt less interest than, per- 
haps, they otherwise would, and ought to have done, in see- 
ing them become so " m flict." We have long seen that 
infant baptism was among them but an empty tradition, a 
form, the soul of which had evaporated ; that ^yiih the j^rin- 
ciples of the Evangelical Congregationalists of Xew England, 
in regard to a regenerate church-membership, it follows ir- 
resistibly, as any child may see, that Baptists are right in 
requiring evidence of actual faith previous to baptism. In 
fact, though we would not have introduced the words our- 
selves in regard to an institution any Christian brethren 
hold sacred, yet as they have done this, we may quote them, 
and admit " the essential absurdity" of mfant baptism, as 
commonly practiced, from the time of Dr. Hopkins down to 
Dr. Bushnell ; and that the ISTew England Pedobaptists 
' Ta^e 82. 2 Parre 96. 



ALL BAPTIST 11^ THEOEY. 249 

have not been able, in the course of two hundred years, to 
attain to any scheme of infant baptism, or settled opinion 
of its ground and import, consistent with their own writers, 
or even consistent with themselves. All this, however, v,^e 
did not expect to have seen confessed so readily in " An 
Argument" in favor of infant baptism. 

Dr. Bushnell also makes a still more pregnant concession 
when he says truly enough, vre doubt not, '' At the time of 
my settlement in the ministry, the council came near reject- 
mg me, because I could say nothing more positive concern- 
ing infant baptism."^ Even now, though he quotes Scrip- 
ture, he does not build much on that, and, indeed, treads 
so very gently and softly on it, as to remind his readers of 
a man walking on what he suspects to be rather rotten ice 
in the spring. 

He brings forward the case of " household baptisms," but 
admits that the power of these proof texts " does not depend 
in the least on the fact that there were children in these 
households." He even thinks " the argument for infant 
baptism rather weakened than strengthened by the supposi- 
tion that there were infants ;" and finally, that " these pas- 
sages * * * certainly do not prove infant baptism in 
just the way in which many have used them as proof texts." ^ 

In fact, infant baptism with him does not rest directly on 
Scripture, but on " a theory'''' of Christian nurture ; and he 
tells us how he obtained it. After relating that he came 
near being rejected for not believing in it, he adds : ''After 
two or three years of reflection, I came upon the discovery 
that all my views of Christian nurture were radically defect- 
ive, and even false. And now what before was dark, or 
even absurd, inmiediately became luminous and dignified."^ 
^ Page 82. 2 Pagos 29, 30. 3 Page 82, 



250 EDWARD'S YIEAVS 

These views we ^dll examine iii a moment, for upon this all 
turns with him. He tells the Congregationalists that some 
of them are simply indifferent, '' not seeing what good it can 
do the child, and others hay e 2^)0 sitive theological objections 
to it." But it is his " settled conviction (now) that no man 
ever objected to infant baptism who had not, at the bottom 
of his objections, the " false views" which create so great 
difficulty in sustaining infant baptism in our (in the Con- 
gregational) Churches."^ In a word, he concedes that, 
unless the " Baptist theory" of Christian nurture, ^. 6., the 
views of Jonathan Edwards, Whiteiield, and the whole 
evangelical theory of the New England Puritans, have been 
wi'ong (for he admits them all to be essentially Baptist), and 
his theory of children growing up Christians right, infant 
baptism is an " essential absurdity." ^ 

We desu-e, then, now to compare the Baptist and Pedo- 
baptist theories of Church membership and Christian nurture, 
upon vrhich the whole of Dr. Bushnell's argument rests; an 
argument which was, it is true, " without publicity," dropped 
by the Committee of the " Massachusetts Sabbath School 
Society" when the controversy waxed warm, but which has 
been publicly " approved'''' by them, and never repudiated. 
It must, at least, be supposed to contain the doctrine of 
infant baptism, as they would like, were it consistent, to 
hold it forth, and is the only ground on Avhich Dr. Bushnell 
thinks it can be reasonably held at all. 

The whole of this argument rests upon these two errors ; 1. 
It makes a serious mistake as to what really is the Baptist 
theory of the operations of Divine grace. 2. Much of 
what it considers as belonging exclusively to the Pedobap- 
tist theory, our own principles admit and embrace quite as 
1 Pages 38, 9. 2 Pago IL 



DESCRIBED. 251 

cordially as this, rejecting it only where it deviates from 
the truth. 

Dr. Bushnell thus describes the "Baptist," or (as he 
sometimes calls it), " Ictic theory," or that of "individual- 
ism," which he puts in contrast mth his own, to set it off 
to a better advantage : 

" It is a religion that begins explosively, raises high 
frames, carries little or no expansion, and after the day is 
spent, subsides into a torpor. * "^ '^ It makes nothing 
of the family, and the Church, and the organic powers God 
has constituted as vehicles of grace. It takes every man 
as if he had existed cdo7ie^ presumes that he is unreconciled 
to God until he has undergone some sudden and explosive 
experience in adult years, or after the age of reason ; de- 
mands that experience, and only when it is reached, allows 
the subject to be an heir of life. Then on the other side 
or that of the Spirit of God, the very act or ictus by which 
the change is wrought, is isolated, or individualized, so as 
to stand in no connection with any other of God's means 
or causes — an epiphany in which God leaps from the stars, 
or some place above, to do a work aj)art from all system, 
or connection with His other works. Religion is thus a 
kind of transcendental matter, which belongs on the out- 
side of life, and has no part in the laws by which life is 
organized — a miraculous epidemic, a lire-ball shot from the 
moon, something holy because it is from God, but so ex- 
ti'aordinary, so out of place that it can not suffer any vital 
connection with the ties, and causes, and forms, and habits, 
which constitute the frame of our history. Hence the de- 
sultory, hard, violent, and often extravagant or erratic char- 
acter it manifests. Hence in part the dreary years of 
decay, and darkness, that interspace our montlis of excite- 



252 THE CHILD TO GKOW UP. 

ment and victory." ^ It is with regret that we see such a 
23icture, such a caricature, drawn of the Baptist theory of 
conversion. It is true he puts us in respectable company, 
and paints the above, not as the description of Baptist 
views, except as a part of that Congregational puritanism 
advanced by Jonathan Edwards, " all Baptist in theory." 
We leave it for others to decide, if it fairly represents the 
belief of the Evangelical Xew England churches, either 
Baptist or Congregational, viewed on the scale of the last 
hundred years. It would be almost an unfair caricature, 
even of the extreme excitements of itinerant evangelists — - 
excitements, not arismg legitimately out of any theory — 
but the boisterous passions of unruly indi\iduals, tolerated 
indeed for a time, by several churches, but soon over. Sim- 
ilar excesses have arisen in all ages and in all parts of the 
world, CA'Cn in Catholic as well as Protestant countiies. 
Tlie Jansenists have exhibited them as well as the Metho- 
dists. They are a phase of reaction from the great disease 
of sin and all religious indifference, and will exhibit them- 
selves with any theory while human nature is in its present 
disordered state. 

The true Pedobai^tisx theory Dr. Bushnell thus states by 
way of contrast. It is, 

" That the child is to geow up a Cheistiax. — In other 
words, the aim, effort, and expectation should be, not as is 
commonly assumed, that the child is to grow uj) in sin, to 
be converted after he comes to a mature age, but that he is 
to open on the world, as one that is sj^iritually renewed, 
not remembering the time when he went through a tech- 
nical experience, but seeming rather to have loved what is 
good, from his earliest years." ^ 

' Pages 68, 9. ^ Page 6. 



A CHRISTIAN. 253 

This theory he illustrates as follows : 

"If we narrowly examine the relation of parent and child, 
we shall not fail to discover something like a law of organic 
connection, as regards character, subsisting between them. 
Such a connection as makes it easy to believe, and natural 
to expect, that the faith of the one will be propagated in 
the other. Perhaps I should rather say such a connection 
as induces the conviction that the character of one is actu- 
ally included in that of the other, as a seed is formed in the 
capsule, and being there matured by a nutriment derived 
from the stem is gradually separated from it." ^ Page 18. 

^ Dr. Bushnell afterward explains his meaning as follows : " I take the 
actings of the parent in the child, both before and after birth, for as far 
as the child's will or individuality are concerned, they are included in the 
same category of passivity, and cover them both by tlie same term ; call- 
ing them ^organic.'' Considering next this organic power as inhabited by 
Christ, and the Spirit of God, and exalted thus into a spiritual state above 
itself, I take my stand at the birth point of the will (not of the body), 
and there I say that the Christian child ought to emerge into individual' 
ity, not as ripened into sin, and set off in it, but as one that is regener- 
ated, quickened unto spiritual life. In other words it is the privilege of 
the Christian, not that he is doomed to give birth to a tainted life and 
cease, j^ that by the grace of God dwelling in him, and in the child, 
llishid^fc bis own character, as an organic mold for the child, and the 
child W^ plastic conformity with the mold provided, he may set forth the 
child into life, as a seed after him — one that is prepared unto a godly life, 
by causes prior to his own will, that is, by causes metaplij^sically organic. 
Tlius every thin^ previous to the will falls into one and the same cate- 
gory. * * * At some time, sooner or later, but only by a gradual 
transition, he comes into his own will, whicli theologically speaking, is 
the time of his birth as a moral subject of God's government ; and if he 
takes up life, as a corrupted subject, so he may and ought also to take it 
up, as a renewed subject, that is, to grow up as a Ghristiany ^ 

(1) Page 94. 



i| 



254 THE BAPTIST THEOKY. 

We will not just here examine very deeply into Dr. Biish- 
nell's theory. Suppose it correct, in fact, that many chil- 
dren are brought to the saving knowledge of God at a 
very early age; he still calls them " regenerated;^'' sup- 
pose that through early training, while there was, as Dr. 
B. v>^ould say, a metaphysical organic connection between 
the parent and child, this should be far more generally the 
case with the children of pious, than of irreligious parents ; 
or suppose even that sometimes the physical and metaphy- 
sical organization of the child of irreligious parents, shall 
not be so favorable to this early development of piety, as 
in the child of pious parents. When then ? Let us be- 
lieve all this, and we do believe it ; still wdiat is there in it, 
at all opposed to the Baptist theory ? 

We may believe that Jeremiah was sanctified from the 
womb, that Samuel " grew up" so piously from earliest in- 
fancy that he was never sensible afterward of any sudden 
or violent change. It may have been so with John the 
Baptist and with Timothy. It may have been, and prob- 
ably was in great part, through pious training and influences 
on the part of pious parents, that all this took place and 
at so early an age. It is certainly implied that in the case 
of Timothy it was. Let all this be granted, and what jSi.en ? 
Where does it touch the Baptist theory ? W 

Dr. Bushnell could only reply, 1. That the Baptist theory 
of Church membership teaches that no persons are fit for 
the Church until they manifest a sensible religious experi- 
ence, and 2. It " tells the child that nothing but sin can be 
expected of him, presumes that he will not grow to a be- 
hever, or be eventually sanctified through his parent's faith, 
and therefore that the rite of baptism is inappropriate." * 
1 Pages 28, 9. 



L 



SENSIBLE EXPO^PvIENCES. 255 

1. As to the first, it is indeed and exactly true that, ac- 
cording to the Baptist theory, none are proper subjects for 
Church membership until they manifest a sensible religious 
experience. But Dr. B. seems to confound two things that 
differ mightily : the sensible experiences of grace, and " ex- 
plosive conversion,'^ or at least " sensible conversion." A 
person may be sensible of being in a gracious state every 
day, without remembering possibly when such experiences 
first began to dawn upon him. With some, these things 
are more gradual in their manifestations, even in riper years, 
than with others ; much more when they take place m the 
dawnings of life. 

The Baptist theory of " effectual calling" does not depend 
in whole or in part on when it takes place. It only asserts 
that there must be credible manifestations of its having 
taken place previous to Church membership. It is not in- 
consistent mth the Baptist theory or practice to baptize a 
person twenty years after he shall have been converted, if 
he has neglected it till then. We object, as much as Dr. 
Bushnell can do, to the taking nothing for evidence of 
being in a state of grace but " an explosive experience." 
We believe, practically, that many a true child of grace is 
long kept in doubt as to his acceptance with God, by look- 
ing for some more sudden, violent and " angular" conver- 
sion than in the nature of things he can ever realize. 

But we also think that, should Dr. Bushnell's statements 
spread and become popular, there Avould be another danger 
more to be dreaded, one pointed out very ably by Dr. Ty- 
ler in his letter, ^. 6., that of the children of pious i^arents, 
supposing tliat usually they Avere not to expect to pass 
through any sensible conversion, but ought to "take it for 
granted" they were in a state of '' effectual calling" because 



256 PKESUMPTIOlSrS OF 

their parents were pious and had had them baptized. Dr. 
Bushnell has mistaken the extreme revival theory of " ex- 
plosive conversions" for the Baptist theory, which only in- 
sists upon sensible experiences of heing in a state of grace. 
But certain it is, if he wants to get rid of a sensible present 
experience of grace, as a necessary prerequisite to full 
Church membership, he would do the Congregational 
Churches of New England the most pernicious evil that has 
been accomplished in a hundred years. We do not under- 
stand him thus. He certainly speaks of all those he calls 
quickened into spiritual life as " regenerated^ ^ But some 
of his illustrations may seem rather unguarded. 

2. But Dr. Bushnell argues further (to quote his own lan- 
guage), that "It must be presumed either that the child 
will grow up a believer, or that he will not ; the Baptist pre- 
sumes that he will not, that nothing but sin can be expected 
of him, and therefore declares baptism inappropriate."^ We 
su]3pose Dr. Bushnell and the Massachusetts Sabbath School 
Committee meant that by declining to baptize them^ we say 
so in effect to the child. And, therefore, fighting against 
this supposed Baptist theory. Dr. Bushnell says, " Who, 
then, has told you that the child can not have the new heart 
of which you spt^ak ?" And we ask, who has told Dr. Bush- 
nell that the Baptist presumes, in declining to baptize an in- 
fant, that he will not grow up a believer, or that he may not 
even now possibly be sanctified from the womb ? And who 
told him that God presumes that he will ? In our view the 
Supreme Being does not presume about the matter, for he 
hnoios^ and so, on the other hand, as we do not pretend to 
know, neither do y^fo, presume to decide, or rather decide to 
presume, about the matter; but as to his johiing the Church, 
^ Page 94. '' Page 28, 9. 



INFANT BAPTISM. 257 

wait the developments and manifestations He gives. In 
our view it would indeed be a presumption to take that 
universally for granted which is, as all must admit, practical- 
ly, so very doubtful. Yet this is the very essence of the 
Pedobaptist theory. The whole philosophy of it is a pre- 
suming to take for granted that in every case the child loill 
groio up a Christian from its very hirth. This is the height 
of presumption. It assumes always a conjunction of three 
things, no one of which can be shown to occur at all. 

1. That the parent shall perfectly discharge his duty. 

2. That the Church shall also perfectly do the same ; and, 

3. That if both of these do thus, God will in every case not 
only save that child at last, but effectually call it in earliest 
infancy ; so that it shall " open on the world spiritually re- 
nevv^ed, not remembering the time wdien it w^ent through a 
technical experience." Now this is the philosophy, the ul- 
timate essence of infant baptism, the innate principle of the 
Pedobaptist theory. It takes for granted that in the case 
of every child baptized, the two former, or human condi- 
tions w^ill be perfectly fulfilled, and then it further presumes 
that the third or divine result will not only eventually but 
immediately follow. This we think the very extreme of 
presuming. 

And here we must allow Dr. Tyler, a Pedobaptist profess- 
or of Theology, to demolish, in his own style, some of the 
presumptions of infant baptism. Speaking of Christian 
Pedobaptist parents, in his letter to Dr. Bushnell, he says : 

" If God had promised to save all their children, on con- 
dition of entire faithfiilness on their part, tliey could not 
appropriate the promise to themselves, for they know tliey 
are not entirely fixithful, but come very far short of their 
duty. 



258 DR. TTLER ON 

" And here permit me to ask, when you maintain that if 
parents were faithful, they might expect to see their cliil- 
dren (as a general thing at least) grow up Christians from 
their earliest childhood, what degree of faithfulness do 
you consider necessary to uisure this result ? Must they be 
sinlessly perfect ? If so, what you have ^v^'itten is labor 
lost, for there are no such parents. But if you mean a de- 
gree of faithfulness short of smless perfection, how great 
must it be ? How faithful must a sinful, erring parent be, 
to render it certam that God will change the hearts of his 
children, at the very beginning of life, before they are old 
enough to receive any verbal instruction ? 

" There are many parents who are eminently pious, and 
whose piety shines m nothing more conspicuously than in 
the education of their children. But they see no evidence 
that their children are pious. On the contrary, they think 
they see decisive evidence that they are not." 

As to the fulfillment of the conditions on the part of the 
Church, Dr. Tyler does not speak. We may believe they 
are not better performed than those of the parents. But 
in relation to the third point, i. 6., the certainty of immedi- 
ate divme renewal, he says : " I^ow the question is, has 
God exphcitly informed us m his word, that he will thus 
early renew the hearts of our children, if we will faithfully 
discharge our parental duties ? Where is any such explicit 
promise to be found ? The duty of the Christian parent is 
analogous to that of the Christian minister. * * * * It is 
true that the faithful minister has reason to hope and be- 
lieve that he mil not labor in vain. But when, how, and to 
what extent God will croA^m his labors with success, he has 
no means of determining. God is a holy Sovereign. 
' Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy.' 



paiie:n^tal faithfulness. 259 

It is true, he employs means, and he gives efficacy to the 
means of his own appointment ; but he does it m his own 
way and in his own time, and such degrees as seem good in 
his sight. It is not always true that the labors of the most 
faithful minister are crowned with the greatest success. 
Many more souls seem to have been converted under the 
preaching of Paul than under the preaching of Christ. 
But surely Paul was not more faithful than his Master. 
The great aim of the Christian minister should be to do his 
duty, and to leave the results with God." 

We see the two theories contrasted ; we see the philos- 
ophy of the two systems. It now only remams that we 
trace some of the chief difficulties and injuries to vital 
religion, that have naturally and necessarily grown out of 
the system of infant baptism, as they are exhibited by Dr. 
Bushnell and Dr. Tyler. It would really seem, from the 
concessions of these two divines, taken together, that it is 
impossible to evolve any theory of infant baptism that will 
not, sooner or later, strangle all spiritual religion in the 
womb. We are far enough from saying that practically it 
has always done so. In ISTew England, the Congregational 
Churches have unquestionably escaped or emerged from this 
fate, " so as by fire." But then all this is accounted for 
when we are told, and told truly, that they have " all be- 
come Baptists in theory," and ought in all consistency " to 
become so in fact." ^ 

But, viewed historically, what a category of errors has 
infant baptism introduced, according to Dr. Bushnell's own 
showing, until, disgusted with the theme, he skips over tlie 
period from Gregory Nazienzen, a.d. 350, to Luther, sim- 
ply saying: "To follow the Church into all the absurd 

1 Page 96. 



260 DE. BUSHNELL S 

opinions on this subject through which she strayed for 
lo7ig ages^ is lumecessary. We descend immediately to the 
Reformation." ^ But even although this might appear a 
pretty quick leap down the pages of history, it does not 
seem to carry him to the bottom of the difficulty, of find- 
ing one consistent theory of infant baptism. For Dr. Bush- 
nell declares that " here we shall find that no settled opinio7i 
on infant haptism and. of Christian nurture has ever been 
attained to. Between Protestant standard writers them- 
selves there has been no agreement." " Owen uses lan- 
guage hardly reconcilable with Calvm, unless it can be 
shown either that all infants who die are elect, or that all 
elect infants die." 

Luther, the German Reformed Church, and the Church 
of England, throw out opinions of the efficacy of this insti- 
tution, that " convey a strong scent of the old errors of 
Romanism. * * * We pass the sea." 

But " the IS'ew England divines have never agreed, and 
do not noio^ as to what the covenant is, what meaning and 
force it has." They " had been accustomed in Europe to 
State Churches, in which baptism practically gave a title to 
complete membership." But the Cambridge Platform of 
1649 "was on a difierent principle, allowing none to be 
members save such as gave evidence of spiritually renewed 
character." Thus occurred what was " more uncomfortable 
to most Christians of that age than we can well imagine ; 
the children of their sons and of their daughters often 
could not be baptized." Hence, in 1662, the half-covenant 
system, a " mongrel scheme ;" the result of which was 
" undoubtedly bad in theory, as it proved to be in its prac- 
tical effects." ^ 

^ Page 56. 2 Pages 5V-62. 



HISTORY OF THEORIES. 261 

" Mr. Stoddard took the far more dignified and consist- 
ent ground" that hoth sacraments are to be regarded as 
means of grace offered to all of moral life. ''Under the 
combined influence of these two changes, or partly by force 
of other causes, religion fell into a serious and alarming 
state of decline. Making every allowance for exaggera- 
tions, there was evidently a serious decline of piety in the 
Church." In fact, Massachusetts became Unitarian.^ 

Such have been the results of the Pedobaptist systems, 
one after another. And yet because Jonathan Edwards 
" brings them round at length unconsciously to the Baptist 
theory," as the only remedy, his system is caricatured as 
one of " extreme individualism," etc. The remarkable part 
of this is not that the above statements are true, but that 
they are so plainly admitted and proved in an argument in 
favor of infant baptism. It was a controversy between two 
Pedobaptists, and hence the concessions both have made 
unthinkingly to the truth of our principles. 

But now let us observe the " dangerous tendencies" of 
infant baptism as exhibited in the mind and language of Dr. 
Bushnell himself. It would seem that, like Dr. Alexander, 
he came near being a Baptist himself at one time : so near 
that, even now, when glancing at the relation of his doctrine 
to the Baptist denomination, he thinks " it may not be in- 
delicate to allude to his own mental experience ;" and tells 
us how near he came to " being rejected by the council at 
his settlement," because he could say '' nothing more posi- 
tive respecting infant baptism." Such cases are more com- 
mon than Dr. B. thhiks, but there is nothing alarming in 
this, as none of them are quite rejected. It is only those 
who reject infant baptism altogether, and are baptized on a 

1 Paffo 64. 



2G2 DR. BUSHXELL'S 

profession of their faith, that are altogether refused. Or 
the contrary, they are ordained as Congregationahsts. They 
baptize a few children, and then are driven, by logical 
necessity, to find some defense for themselves, and then, 
naturally enough, " what before was dark, or even absurd ^''^ ^ 
becomes " luminous and dignified." AYe are far from be- 
lieving that there is a conscious insincerity in such cases. 
Infant baptism has been associated with many pious senti- 
ments and afifections m their imaginations, and Avhere they 
can not find scriptural evidence for it, they still consider it 
an edifying and a touching rite. And many things ^ill 
seem ^^ositive evidence of a controverted ceremony con- 
stantly practiced in such circumstances. 

The mam argument Avliich appears to have satisfied Dr. 
Bushnell's own mind, and that of the Committee of the 
Massachusetts Sabbath School Society, when suggested, was, 
as we saw before, " a law of organic connection as regards 
character, subsisting between the parent and child ; such a 
connection as induces the conviction that the character of 
one is actually mcluded m that of the other, as a seed is 
formed in the capsule.^ 

Xow, after making all allowance for his explanations about 
a " metaphysically organic connection," and acknowledging, 
as we do, great truth, value, and beauty in very many of 
his ideas on this subject, yet who can read such language 
without feeling that his words are not sufiiciently guarded ; 
that there are " dangerous tendencies" here ; and this arises 
directly from his rejecting the Baptist theory, which allows 
full scope for all that is true in what he advances. It is 
just from trying to advance something " more positive" in 
favor of the Pedobaptist philosophy than truth will warrant, 
' Page 82. ^ Page 18. 



DANGEROUS TENDENCIES 263 

that he gets into difficulty. We can not see that "it is 
easy to believe, and natural to expect, that the faith of the 
one will be propagated in the other." Faith is the gift of 
God. It can not be produced by any organic connection, 
physical or metaphysical. Those things which tend to pro- 
duce or prepare the mind, in a certain sense, for a work of 
grace, may, and do result from the connection between 
pious parents and their children. A parent puts a Bible 
into the hand of his child : unquestionably that book has in 
it a tendency to prepare the mind for a work of grace — a 
tendency, if you please, to produce holmess. A parent 
takes his child to hear the preaching of the Gospel : this has 
the same influence ; yet who would think it judicious to 
say that it is easy to believe, and natural to expect, that 
either the Bible or preaching will " propagate faith" in the 
heart of the hearer or reader. 

But whatever modifying efiect the parental connection 
may exert upon different dispositions in the child, it is cer- 
tainly not correct to say that the character of the one is 
actually included in the character of the other. It would 
be unjust to treat the child of an habitual drunkard as 
" presumptively" intoxicated.^ Character is the sum of 
the dispositions, as molded and modified not only by her- 
editary tendencies and parental influence, but by the air 
breathed, the climate inhabited, the companions of child- 
hood, by each look, thought, word of every stranger, eacli 
accident and action of life, good and bad. Latent tenden- 
cies of former generations, fire-side stories, infant tales, the 

^ In other matters, men of common sense wait the development of facts, 
nor act until they appear ; and are we forever in the Church to put fic- 
tions and presumptions in their place ? This is the real issue between 
Baptists and Pedobaptists. 



264 DE. 

school attended, all modify the character. Who, then, can 
entertam the conviction that the character of the child is 
" actually included" m that of the parent ? 

XoTT, Dr. Bushnell ^ not merely incautious and incorrect 
here in his language, but the ideas which he means to con- 
vey by it, are, as Dr. Tyler charges, positively full of " dan- 
gerous tendencies." And all these incorrect words and 
dangerous ideas arise from the logical necessity he felt m 
his o^vn mind of getting hold of " something more positive" 
in favor of infant baptism than he set out with, or could 
find in the Gospel. There is nothing in his whole scheme 
to prevent the child from faUing into an error which has 
been most wide-spread and fatal in all Pedobaptist churches, 
^. 6., that it most probably inherits a pious character from 
its parents, without any evidence of the fact. This is, indeed, 
a necessary part of the theory, and Dr. Bushnell, by a 
necessity of his own mind, brings it out. But Dr. Tyler, 
and all other Congregationalists, very properly shrink back 
vdth alarm from an error that has already proved so de- 
structive among themselves to all S2)iritual religion. 

The Baptist, by not presumiug to decide concernmg the 
faith of the child either one way or other, from that of the 
parent, but watching closely, and requirmg m each case 
sensible present experiences indicative of being in a gracious 
state, derives all the advantage that can come from the 
Pedobaptist views, and avoids all dangerous tendencies,, 
both ecclesiastically, of introducing all the world into the 
Church ; and experimentally, of leading those to believe tliey 
live who are dead. 

TTe do not mean to say that Dr. Bushnell would practi- 
cally take it for granted that all baptized children are 
Christians. This he indimantlv denies, saving: " ask vour- 



DANGEKOUS TENDEN^CIES. 205 

selves whether it [a passage in his discourse], teaches that 
Christian parents are to take it for granted that their chil- 
dren are pious ?" But notwithstanding his disclaimer, Dr. 
Tyler has fixed it upon him. Though Dr. B. may not 
practically wish always to carry it to that length, his lan- 
guage does, when it says, "the character of the one is actu- 
ally included in that of the other." ^ His system, indeed 
the whole Pedobaptist theory implies it, more strongly 
than any words. Of this he himself is witness. For 
while he calls " baptismal regeneration" " a great error in 
the form in which it is held," yet in another form it seems 
to him a great truth, that is to say he proceeds, " The re- 
generation is not actual hut only presmnptive^ and every 
thing depends upon the organic law of character pertaining 
between the parent and the child," etc.^ Infant baptism is, 
he says, " a seal of faith in the parent applied over to the 
child on the ground of a presumption that his faith is wrap- 
ped up in the parent's faith. It sees the child in the parent, 
and counts him presmnptively a believer and a Christian." 
And yet Dr. Buslmell denies and exclaims, " ask yourselves 
whether [this theory] teaches that Christian parents are to 
take it for granted that their children are pious." What 
else does the word ''presume" mean but just to "take for 
granted," to take before proof or trial or without examina- 
tion ? Richardson so defines this word, and so Webster, 
and so Crabbe, in substance ; only that the latter adds a hint, 
especially intended, one would think, for the Pedobaptists, 
and peculiarly for Dr. Bushnell, " we must be careful not to 
presume upon more than we are fully authorized to take for 
certain." 

Here then is infant baptism declared publicly to teach 

1 Page 18. ^ Pago 33, 

12 

# ^ 



266 DR. bushnell's 

every time it is administered, what Dr. Biislmell himself 
afterward, with indignation, repels the charge of teaching, 
and what Dr. Tyler lifts his hands m horror at, asking, 
" What Christian pastor would dare take the res]3onsibility 
of teachmg it to the baptized children and youth of his 
congregation ?" But Dr. Bushnell does teach it puhhcly 
and so did the Massachusetts Sabbath School Society for a 
time, by so openly admitting this to be the great lesson of 
infant baptism. 

Yet once more the theory of infant baptism has led Dr. 
Bushnell, ecclesiastically, and to a dangerous extent practi- 
cally, to appear as the opponent of sensible experiences of 
grace and revivals. We have no idea that he would do 
any such thing deliberately and completely; indeed he 
says — "Let me not be understood as rejecting revivals of 
religion," and many of his views on this subject we heart- 
ily approve. But unused to the Baptist theory, which con- 
sists in sensible experiences of being in a gracious state, he 
confounds quite too much all such things with " explosive 
conversions" and revivals with a " miraculous epidemic, a 
fire-ball discharged from the moon," etc. Let any one read 
the sixty-ninth page of his argument before quoted, and 
say if such is not the fact. 

It is very remarkable, but mfant baptism leads him also 
into theories and views, dangerous from their tendency to 
produce just the error which the Pedobaptist scheme is 
thought by its advocates j)articularly calculated to guard 
agamst, ^. 6., throwing responsibihty off the parent in 
relation to the religious training of the child. Thus he 
speaks of it as formmg a relation " between parents and 
churches on the one side, and children on the other." * 
^ See page "72. 



DE. BUSHNELL S SYSTEM. 267 

Now, if as Pedobaptist writers say, there is sucli a tendency 
in parents to neglect their duty, and throw off their respon- 
sibihty in regard to their children, will not this dividmg of 
it with the Church, just favor that tendency and really pro- 
duce a laxity at home — a sense of only a divided or joint 
responsibility in quarters where God has put it undividedly ? 
There is in this day too much of that already, and what 
with Sabbath-schools, and catechisms, and among Episcopa- 
lians sjDonsors, the whole work of religious training is left 
in the hands of the Church instead of where the God of 
nature and of grace has placed it, in those of the parents. 

We value Sabbath-schools as above all praise, but if any 
other power is systematically to step in between the parent 
and child on religious subjects, no matter whether it be a 
Sabbath-school teacher, a sponsor, or an orthodox minister, 
claiming a kind of official supervision, and a divinely insti- 
tuted partnership with the parent on behalf of the Church, 
dividing with him the responsibility, the result will be per- 
nicious to all parties. No parent has a right to form any such 
partnership. He may not lay off his personal responsibility. 

The Baptist theory is both more natural and more scrip- 
tural. It holds the parent to be the officer appointed of 
God, for the religious training of his own child. It per- 
mits of no shirking of the responsibility by a division of 
offices. He must make use of such agencies and assistances 
as he can. Sabbath-schools, Bible-classes, sermons, cate- 
chisms, prayers, but ho is the responsible supervisor alone. 
If he neglects his duty palpably, by failing to take advan- 
tage of all reasonable facilities, the Church must discipline 
him for neglect but not slip in between hhn and his own 
chHd. 

Dr. Bushnell charges the Baptist theory with " excessive 



268 DR. bushi^ell's system. 

individualism," but tlie opjDOsite system, it will be seen, 
naturally tends to downright Socialism. Take the plan 
of Fourierite communities, and you might almost fancy 
they had obtained the germ of their thought from the cove- 
nant of infant baptism. For " parents and churches^'''' read 
" parents and eo'inmunities''' on the one side, and " children" 
on the other, and you see at a glance all the difference. 
Both would rather seem poor imitations of the education 
of Spartan children. 

The Baptist view is far more comprehensive. It allows 
scope and makes provision for parental religious training of 
children as ample, and more so than the Pedobaptist theory. 
It is the only scheme that throws the responsibility thor- 
oughly and wholly where it belongs — on the parent ; and 
does not divide it out into as many hundred fragments as 
there are members of the Church, or deacons, priests, bish- 
0]DS, and cardinals, up to the pope himself. 

It provides room for ah that is true in Dr. Bushnell's 
theory of " organic connection," physical and metaphysical, 
between the pious parent and the child. It provides ample 
room even for the child to " grow up a Christian," msensible 
of any particular moment of conversion, yet being truly re- 
generate, to bow his head like young Samuel, and worship 
the God of his parents, and partake of the blessings of 
Christian ordinances. It provides the only scheme for this 
to be accomplished, without danger of flooding the Church 
with unbelievers, in requiring that the candidate have pres- 
ent sensible experiences of grace, a conscious daily repent- 
ance for sin and walk with God. It is true our scheme does 
not teach parents or children either to " take it for granted" 
that this has abeady taken place without evidence that " the 
faith of the parent has been propagated in the child" as a 



DR. BUSH^ELL'S SYSTEM. 269 

matter of course, througli Christian nurture. But tlie 
Baptist theory holds as essential the doctrine of regenera- 
tion by grace, that natural goodness is not sufiicient, that 
there must be a supernatural work of the Spirit on the 
heart, a death to sin, and new life to righteousness, in fine, 
that we " must be born again." 

And it leans to sensible conversions and repentance as the 
most usual manner in which the ranks of the army of Christ 
are as a whole recruited. And who will doubt that this is 
the case ? Is not this the way in which the multitudes are, 
and must be brought in, who are not now in a state of 
grace ? Is it not thus that their children will usually be 
brought even in Dr. Bushnell's own view ? And practically 
is it not thus that the large majority even of the children 
of all pious parents are brought ? 

It must never be forgotten that although Christianity is 
in no respect inconsistent with natural or universal re- 
ligion, yet that it contemplates man from a different and 
nearer stand-point. It views him as sick, and comes to him 
as a remedial rather than a normal system, it views him 
as in bondage to sin, and sets before him liberty, as a sinner, 
and brings him salvation. " 1 came," said Christ, " not to call 
the righteous, but sinners to repentance." This is the pecu- 
liarity of the system. I^atural religion regards man as a 
holy being, needing only to see virtue in order to choose it. 
Christianity presupposes sin. It does not contradict natural 
or universal religion. So far as that goes, and can go, well. 
But the peculiar genius of the Gospel is quite different. 
It is not that of original health, but of health restored by 
its own medicines. Its province is that of the physician, 
and they that are Avhole need not the physician, but those 
that are sick. 



270 OUEVALIKR IUINSK>r's 

The hoarl of a family Avill stTivo so to roc^ulate the food, 
ololhin<>', and liabits of liis cliildrcMi, that they shall maintain 
uniform liealtli the yv.w round. Uut yet he knows tliat 
owinji; to a thousand occuri'iMUH's, they will lUH'd medicines, 
and the physician, and that it would be absurd in his sehemo 
of life to overlook or (»xelud(» remedies. To treat his chil- 
dren as always in lu allh, mio-ht otlen cost him their lives. 

So tlu^ wisi* and pious parcMit will striven to train his 
childriMi so thai tlu^y may "L;'row np^' in the nurture and ad- 
monition of tlu» Lord, and as holy as possible. But he will 
not expiH't ])i-actically this rc^sult, without e\']>osure and sub- 
j(H'tion to sin, and th(M'cloi-(^ the uiumI of eomiuL!," to (^hrist. 
(jleniM'ally tluM'e will be in the r(^lii;ious history of each, sea- 
sons of markt'd spiritual crisis, and ev(Mi where they seem to 
grow uj) holy youths without sensible transitions fi'om the 
sorrow o\' penitence to the joy of ])ardon, it is only because 
these things be<j:an so early, and tak(^ i)laee so constantly, 
that there nevcM* was a day when ihvy were not sensible of 
them. This it is for iIumu to ''i^row up Christians." 

Such a view of the work of grace on the souls of chil- 
dren, is surely not cont radictory, but entirely coincident ^vith 
S[)iritual regiMieration, and sensible ex])(M*iences of grace as 
universally ncH'cssary to C^hurch mendxM'shij). I>ut, any 
other view, however ably advocated, and cautiously guard- 
ed, must be full, not only of " dangerous tendencies" always, 
but destructive results too often. 



i^ irr. Chevalier Bunsen's View op Baptism. 

Pr. Hunsen distends infant ba|)lism on much the same 
g(Mieral priticiple as Coleridge and Neauder. Yet he 
goes further than any oi^ tluMu in exhibiting its non-apoS' 



VIEW OF BAPTISM. 271 

tolio origin, while y(it at the Hame time defending it on tho 
ground of those Church-State viewH to wliich he, Dr. Ar- 
nold, and others, are so wedded : views which seem through 
infant baptism almost inherent in European religion, press- 
ing it down as an incubus, lie admits explicitly that Pedo- 
baptism in the modem sense of the word * * * ^^as 
vMerly wnknovm to the early Church, not only down to the 
end of the second, but indeed to the middle of the third 
century.* 

Yet he adds,'^ '' Upon closer and deeper reflection it will 
appear wise to retain Pedobaptism, hut to remodel the whole 
haptinmal discipline, * >jc >h '^p^^ ^},j^ ^,^^^^ \^y ^]^^ ^^.^^ 

place the doctrine of Bihlical hapf/lsra raunt he reforraedm 
the sense of the (ierman Church, and of the doctrinal 
works of Schleiermacher, Neander, Nitzsch, and the Ger- 
man school in general. According to this view, our act of 
baptism forms a whole, the commencement of which is the 
sprinkling of the child, the conclusion the pledge of the 
grown up and instructed young Christian sealed by a bless- 
ing." ^ Afterward the author admits that which he proposes 
can only be done "by positively and practically realizing 
the idea that the baptism of new-born children is the out- 
ward sign of the vow of th.e parentn to dedicate their child 
to God as his gift intrusted to them, and to prcjpare it by 
a Christian education for becoming a member of the Chris- 
tian Church, until it be itself able to profess the faith in 
Christ, and to make the vow of a godly life dedicated to 
God and the brethren." 

Here, then, it is proposed in the first place to ^'-reform the 
biblical idea of baptism," coolly to remodel the whole tiring 

* IlippolytuH and his Timca. vol iii. p. 170. 

2 Pago 211. ' Vol. iii. p. 211. 



272 CHEVALIER BUXSEN'S 

on tlie basis of historical philosophy, maldng it the vow of 
the parent, not the child. All this is clone without any 
more regard for its heing the institution of Christ and Ms 
Apostles than if it was merely some venerable custom of 
the middle ages, to be altered, remolded, or taken away, 
according to the whims and taste of these modern German 
architects in the work of reconstructing the spiritual tem- 
ple. It is this ill-disguised disregard, not to say contempt, 
for the institutions of Jesus Christ and his Apostles which 
here again, as in the remarks of Coleridge, is the first thing 
which strikes us m a passage such as the above. Much as 
we must and may honor the excellent tone and truly Chris- 
tian spirit of this man, and of his writings generally, it is 
painful to see him, merely because he has been brought 
up m the midst of Pedobaptism, defend it on principles ut- 
terly subversive of the divine authority of every institution 
of positive Christianity. Here, m direct disregard of what 
he had professed at the commencement of his work, ^. e., to 
adhere strictly to the Xew Testament as a basis, he de- 
liberately proposes to " reform the Bible." 

We have then the distinct acknowledgment that the idea 
which we are to realize in infant baptism is " the vow of the 
parents to dedicate their child to God," and not the vow of 
the baptized. Yet he has before admitted that " the true 
purport of the baptism ordained by Christ" is "that no man 
can be a member of the communion of saints but by Ms own 
solemn vow."^ And he has declared'^ that, "When the 
Church attached rites and promises of blessing to any thing 
except to the conscious abandonment of sin, and to the vol- 
%intary vov^ of dedicathig life and soul to the Lord, the 
longing for real truthful reformation died away in the same 
^ Yol. iii, p. 119. 3 Page 198. 



VIEW OF BAPTISM. 273 

proportion among her members." Thus infant sprinkling, 
by his own confession, if baptism in any sense of the ^Yord,• 
would be " another 'baptism'^'' from that instituted by Christ. 
So that we have, at best, one Lord, one faith, and tif^o bap- 
tims. 

N'or is this less the case because, at the close of a number 
of years, he proposes to add on another ceremony, Confirm- 
ation, which he forms into the completion of the baptism 
by the personal ratification and vow of the subject. The 
best that could be said, would be that there were two bap- 
tisms, joined in many cases no doubt, by a connecting link 
of pious instruction. But in the vast majority of instances, 
there is practically no such connection, and where there is, 
the danger then ensues that this very link should cause what 
he calls the first part of baptism, to draw after it the rest 
of the chain of profession as a matter of course^ and with- 
out any personal abandonment of sin or spiritual regeneration 
of the soul. In England, for instance, what do we see but 
infant baptism followed, as a matter of course^ by confirma- 
tion and communion, whether there be any conscious aban- 
donment of sin or not. So it ever must be, and so it ever will. 

Even if there be little or no deep religious instruction, 
custom is quite suflScient, and it wields the two rites together 
and draws the young people by links of ceremony from the 
one form to the other, from infant sprinkling to confirma- 
tion, and from confirmation to the communion-table without 
any vital Christianity. Those Avho participate in them thus 
become " confirmed," not m holiness, but in iniquity, " con- 
firmed" in the notion that an impenitent life is not incon- 
sistent with the profession of Clu'istianity. 

There is no doubt that the idea more or less prevails 
where hifant sprinkling is practiced m connection with evan- 

12* 



274 CHEVALIER BUXSEX'S 

gelical piety, that however worthless or invalid the baptism 
may be hi itself as the appomted Christian profession, yet 
that being afterward ratified by the sincere faith of the 
party, and his taking upon himself the vows which ought to 
be made personally in that ordinance, it thereby becomes a 
valid sacrament. But what would be the advantage of it 
in case it Avere ? According to this supposition it is in fact 
no real baptism till ratified by the personal adoption of the 
candidate ; why not then, like the Baptist, defer the rite 
altogether until the party is able and willing to take these 
vows upon himself. Xo power of man, however, could make 
a bond, drawn u^d, signed, sealed, and ratified in a manner 
at all analogous to infant baptism, and its attempted confirma- 
tion, worth, as such, the parchment on which it was drawn, on 
the simple iDrinciple that " you can not confirm a nullity." 

And yet this is perha2:)s the most specious argument used 
as a plea against the duty of believers to be baptized in the 
present day. " I was sjDrinkled in infancy," a person will 
say, " and on becoming a Clnistian (or perhaps before) I 
took the vows of baptism uj^on myself; the rite has thus 
been made valid by my own ratification, however void and 
unauthorized a ceremony infant baptism may in itself be." 

It is unquestionably true that after a person has once taken 
on himself the vows made by his sponsors at his baptism, 
he is bound, not only by the general law of his duty to 
God, but still more specifically by his assumption of the 
baptismal promises. Yet it does not follow that his baptism 
is valid. It is the promise he has made, and not the act of 
baptism that binds him. He may by this, place hunself un- 
der the obligations to lead the life of the baptized, but can 
not clahn its privileges, without complying personally with 
its requirements. The following legal decision of Lord 



VIEW OF BAPTISM. 275 

Ellenboroiigli, one of the highest English authorities, and 
adopted in this country so far as to settle the principle of 
American Common Law, in such instances, may illustrate the 
universal instincts as to what is just and fitting in such cases. 
A minor gave a penal bond for £100. On coming of age 
he ratified and confirmed the bond, but subsequently re- 
fused to pay, and pleaded that "the bond being void a6 
origine^ can not be ratified and confirmed in any way, be- 
cause confirmation implies the existence of the thing to be 
confirmed," that therefore " neither a new promise or new 
delivery would make the bond good which was originally 
void." And it was urged on the other side, that if the in- 
strument was set aside it v\^ould follow, '* that in no possible 
way could an infant after full age afiirm such an obligation." 
The bond was pronounced invalid on the ground that it re- 
quired " the act after full age to be of as great solemnity as 
the original instrument." ^ Hence it is a principle of Ameri- 
can Common Law, in such cases, that a penal bond " being- 
void," even if afiirmed, the action to recover "must always 
be founded on the new promise and not on the bond." If, 
then, such an instrument would not bind a man, how much 
less shall he have the right to claim the benefits of it to him- 
self, as a most solemn covenant. 

To make the illustration, however, completely parallel, it 
ought to be supposed that, instead of the minor having 
signed the bond himself, his guardian durhig his infancy 
should have afiixed his ward's name, Avithout his knoAvledge 
or consent: what subsequent aftirmation or delivery could 
render such bond a legal instrument, or its seal bindmg ? 
Any precedence which such a paper might seem to possess 
would have to be waived; and if the other party were en- 
^ See Maulo and Selwyn's Rep. 47*7. 



276 • CHEVALIER BUNSEN'S 

titled to this precedence it would be the duty of the minor, 
on coming of age, to give a new bond altogether, which 
would have a force that the old one, however ratified, would 
not be made to possess. 

To apply now this illustration : Baptism is, so to speak, 
the sealed instrument, acknowledging our obligations to 
lead a Christian life, and through which we publicly claim 
the blessings of being Christ's acknowledged disciples. It 
is a solemn covenant transaction, i)lacing the seal of Christ's 
disciples publicly upon us. Sponsors and parents may vow 
and covenant in the name of an infant, but it is without any 
authority from Him. And beyond all of this we have the 
confession of Dr. Bunsen that " the baj)tism of new-born 
children is the outward sign of the voio of the parents to 
dedicate their child." Arrived at years of discretion, and 
become a Christian, that child desires to take the vows of 
God upon himself. How shall he do it ? How would he 
be done by in a similar transaction of daily life. 

If any of us had an important covenant depending on 
such an instrument, and the other party, on coming of age, 
should wish to receive some great benefit fi'om it, were he 
to promise always to respect it as valid, and solemnly to 
ratify what he knew to be a nullity, but refuse to sign a 
new bond, might it'^iot be a proper reply that at least be- 
fore he claimed any thing from such an instrument, he should 
make it what it purported to be ? And if it were his duty 
from any cause to give a legal bond, an acknowledgment 
or ratification of his father's unauthorized promise to induce 
huTL to do it would be no fulfillment of that duty. 

Doubtless every such Christian is bound to lead a holy 
life. But it is his promise that binds him, and not a valid 
baptism. And such a man has no right to claun any privi- 



VIEW OF BAPTISM. 277 

leges on the ground of such a baptism, the oMigation to 
submit to which remains upon him. Why is it that in the 
most solemn duties of religion men are willing to put 
up with what Bunsen rightly names " patchwork and ruins, 
shams and phantoms," fictions they would esteem utterly 
worthless and null in the business of daily life ? By no 
subsequent process can a baptism, originally void, be ren- 
dered valid. The ordinance bemg "the sign and seal," 
which makes it, so to speak, a covenant rather than a mere 
verbal promise, is, owing to the utter incompetence of the 
parties at the time (or because the real parties do not cov- 
enant at all), worthless and incapable of being rendered 
good, not having been a profession of his personal faith. 
Upon these grounds not only Baptists, but all those in other 
communions who occupy the position of Dr. Bunsen, aije 
bound to treat it as utterly invalid, however afterward af- 
firmed by the personal assumption of its vows. 

We have so far supposed the proper /orm, at least, to 
have been adhered to in the body of the instrument. But 
in the case of infant baptism, as it is called (and as we have 
called it from courtesy, but nothing else), all this is reversed, 
except in the Greek Church. All others have taken away 
the very thing that alone is the baptism — immersion. They 
have passed the act, to borrow a legislative figure, without 
the enacting clause, signed the bond, but torn off the seal, 
and inserted magical incantations instead of the names of 
witnesses. Let any one read over the baptismal service of 
the Episcopal Church for infants, how, substituting sprink- 
ling for immersion, it demands of an infant, but is answered 
by a sponsor, and declaring it regenerated thereby, contra- 
dicts and confuses the most solemn truths, omitting every 
thing that baptism is, and making it appear every thing 



278 CHEYALIEK BUNSEN'S 

tliat it is not, even in Dr. Bunsen's view ; and then say if 
sncli a ceremony is, or can be made a valid Christian Bap- 
tism. What lawyer would thus judge of a sealed instrument 
in any transaction of life beside. 

But this, it may be said, only shows the worthlessness, 
not the injurious consequences of infant sprinkling. Let us 
proceed, then, to such a passage as the following from the 
pen of Dr. Bmisen : "In the second place, the superstition 
that such children of Christian parents as die of tender age 
unbaptized are under damnation, from which they must be 
rescued by baptism, is to be ^^ut down forever." 

This is just, and bold, and admirable, so far as it goes ; 
but must it not suggest to every man this question : Why 
first teach through infant baptism this fearful dogma, or 
i^Hply it, as Coleridge admits that the ceremony does, and 
as mfant baptism, viewed in the light of Church history, 
clearly and ever has done, only at last to contradict the 
whole ? Why not rather defer baptism until the i3arty is 
old enough to choose for himself? dedicate infants to God 
by prayer, and any other rites that may seem appropriate as a 
voluntary religious act, but not pretend to confer baptism 
until there be in it " the answer of a good conscience toward 
God," ^ as well as the washing of the body in water by im- 
mersion. 

There, are passages in the introduction to the third volume 
of Chevalier Bunsen's work in regard to the need of a 
second grand reconstructive Reformation, which would 
fivor well the view that, in the judgment of our author, 
changes quite as sweeping in pubhc sentiment as the restor- 
ation of believers' baptism, m place of that of infants, are 
expected, and sought by the author as necessary steps to 
' 1 Peter, iiL 21. 



VIEWS OF BAPTISM. 279 

the restoration of pure Christianity. He tells iis, for in- 
stance, that " a severe trial awaits any one who looks prim- 
itive Christianity in the face." " You take your stand," he 
proceeds, " upon the Church ; here is its commencenient. 
You take your stand upon the Bible, here is its first apos- 
tolical realization. What is required of you is not to sub- 
stitute scholarship and research for simple Christian faith, 
much less to set up the idol of philosophy in the shrine of 
religion. * * ♦ You live in the nineteenth century, one 
of historical philosophy and of reconstruction. The work 
to which we are called is unweariedly and humbly to sweep 
the porch of the temple, to clear the floor. 'Not to riot as 
destructives in the darkened chambers, but to bestir our- 
selves to restore and to allow the light of heaven to penetrate 
within tl^n. It is the rubbish of false learning and con- 
ventional scholasticism which separates us from the sanc- 
tuary ; and it is high time to sweep it away, as the signs of 
the latter days have appeared, in which infidel superstition 
intends to sweep the altar, and willful falsehood the throne 
of .truth. 

" What is to be done ? The question at this moment, is 
not how to carry out, but how to prepare a second grand 
reconstructive Reformation, The porch of the Temple 
must first be more thoroughly cleansed than it was in the 
sixteenth, and above all restored more honestly than it was 
in the seventeenth century, and lastly the work must be 
handled more practically than it has been done by the crit- 
ical German school of this age." 

^N'ow surely Dr. Bunsen has conceded CAX^ry thing. lie 
allows infant baptism to be utterly unscriptural. He con- 
cedes the miserable stiito of religion of Europe, through 
the corruptions of Christianity ; declares that the prcju- 



280 CHETALIZE BUXSZX-S 

dices of men have got to receive '' a severe trial-' in order 
to the restoration of primitive Christianity ; that this res- 
toration can only be effected through a second grand recon- 
structive reformation, in which the porch of the Temple 
shah be cleansed, and more jjractlcaUy restored than has yet 
been done by the learned men of modem Germany — 
more honestly and thoroughly than by any of the Retbrmed 
Churches. 

It is strange sometimes to see how the wisest overlook 
the things which are transpiring imder their eyes — how 
Christians receive the very blessings tor which they have 
been praying, and recognize them not as they come. Had 
Chevaher Bunsen only looked at home, he might have seen 
some two hundred Baptist congregations springing up in 
Germany aU within the last twenty years, and excMily meet- 
ing the requisitions above given. 

Of the progress value of the Baptist theory in Amer- 
ica, he seems better able to form a just idea, than of the 
same principles in his own coimtry. 

"• How httle the National Churches of the seventeenth 
century can make head against the onsets of the Bap- 
tists, in countries where a great and free rehgious move- 
ment exists, is evinced by the fact that among serious Chris- 
tians of the English race, in the TTnited States, the Baptist 
or Congregational preachers are on the increase more than 
any other sect, so that they form already the most numer- 
ous and most progressive community." * 

This change is affecting, and has already to a great ex- 
tent altered the whole texture of American Christianity 
from that of Europe, having abolished infant baptism to a 
large extent where it occurs on that continent, and insisting 
^ YoL iiL p 209. 



VIEWS OF BAPTISM. 281 

on personal piety as essential to Churcli membersliip. Upon 
its spread, tlirougliout the world, depends the future spirit- 
ual prosperity of Europe, and of mankind, to a degree 
not easily conceived. A few years ago, and shortly before 
the death of ]N"eander, some Baptist ministers calling on him 
with letters of introduction, he conversed very freely and 
candidly on the baptismal question with them, after a short 
pause, remarking — " Ah^ there is a future for you JBap- 
tists:' 

In the mean time who can forbear to join with Chevalier 
Bunsen in uttering such language as the following : 

" Let every one cleanse his own heart and house as weU 
as he can. When the feeling of the misery which is com- 
ing, and a real faith in the saving truth which is in Christ 
shall have, thoroughly j^enetrated the nations; then mil the 
Spirit of God assuredly come upon them Avith might, either 
for the reformation, or the annihilation of the existing 
churches. Whether this crisis will end in the renewal, or 
the destruction of the j)i'esent nations and states, will de- 
23end upon the position they take in face of the demands of 
the Gospel, and the wants of the times. For every nation 
and age has its time and its day of visitation, after Avhich 
its fate is sealed. 

'' This great movement, however, will assuredly not lead 
to the destruction of Christianity but to its establishment 
on a firmer basis ; not to the lowering of the person of 
Jesus of I^azareth, but to his greater glorification ; and 
God's Kingdom of Truth and Liberty on earth, will advance 
as triumphantly over the perishing as over the renovated 
kingdoms and states of the present world." 



282 NORTH BRITISH REVIEW 



§ IT. The North British Review on Infant Baptism. 

" Let us not be misunderstood ; we have not mshed to 
breathe the sHghtest msinuation agamst the legitimacy and 
the importance of infant baptism. We have expressed our 
persuasion that it is a rite unknoA^ai to Scripture and that 
it was jDrobably unpracticed in the apostohc age ; but we 
also firmly believe that it is an institution eminently con- 
formable to the genuine spirit of Christianity, as such war- 
ranted by Scripture, and in the highest degree valuable to 
the Christian Church." ' 

Thus writes the ISTorth British Review. 
It is with difficulty after making every allowance for the 
effect of custom and prejudice, that we can understand how 
a Protestant Christian, how a Presbyterian especially, could 
pen such hues. In one paragraph the writer hails it as the 
dawning of a bright day that '' Dr. M'N'eil, Mr. Litton, and 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, are perceiving that the prac- 
tice of infant baptism is not found in Scripture." In the 
next, he declares that he would not insinuate a word against 
its " legitimacy and unportance !" And yet afterward he 
urges that rehgious controversies are every day " assuming 
more and more the sharp and definite form of an antago- 
nistic struggle between the Christianity of Scripture and 
the Christianity of Tradition." ^ 

True it is, and lamentably true, that in this " antagonistic 
struggle," the organ of the Free Church of Scotland does 
not wish to breathe a word more against infant baptism 
than is absolutely forced out of it by the ^'pressure of the 
la?igua(/e of Scripture ^'^'' as it says. Its position in regard 



August, 1852, p. 211, Amer. Ed. ^ Page 212. 



1 



OI^ INFAISTT BAPTISM. 283 

to infant baptism, is like that of Austria at this moment 
between the pressure of the Allies on one side, and Russia 
on the other. It admits too much, to make what it reserves 
decently consistent. It admits that the language of Scrip- 
ture, applied to infant baptism, would teach the most fear- 
ful and fatal errors ; that it is a rite " utterly unknown to 
Scripture ;" and yet professes to be not quite sure as to its 
being unpracticed in the apostolic age; commends it as "in 
the highest degree valuable," and finds in circumcision 
" ample authority," and in " every Christian heart an echo" 
" for the public incorporation of infants into the Church of 
Christ." 

Is it not, then, as plain as the day, that if infant baptism 
was ever practiced by the Apostles, if it was any thing but 
a corruption, it must have been imiversal at the beginning ? 
That if circumcision furnishes ample authority now, it did 
in the first ages ? If, in all the language of ScrijDture, not 
one word of it will apply to infant baptism, Avithout leading 
to the most awful consequences, it never could have been 
known to the Apostles. And it must be utterly a?^^^-Scrip- 
tural. In another number,^ this Review, commendmg 
Bunsen's ideas of baptism, in w^hich he asserts ''''confidently^'^ 
that infant baptism was unknown, the reviewer " can not 
hold this to be wholly determined." To us there seems 
some little want of candor just here, after such a masterly 
article as most of that from which we continue to quote. 
" In the absence of all express institution of infant baptism 
by Christ or his Apostles, we dare not call it a complete 
sacrament till the consciousness of the baptized person has 
become capable of fulfilling the spiritual condition of tlie 
sacramental blessing, and become susceptible of its recep- 
» May, 1853, p. 66. 



284 ISrOETH BRITISH EEYIEW 

tion.'' Why not then defer it until the spiritual conditions 
are fulfilled ? 

^'The celebration of the outward rite, at an age when in- 
telligence is still dormant, separates, in respect of time, the 
two elements w^hich are necessary to constitute a sacra- 
ment ; and we have not a particle of authority for suppos- 
ing that the sacramental virtue can be realized till both 
elements are present. A spiritual blessing, of necessity im- 
plies a spiritual recipient. This momentous truth, which 
hes at the foundation of the Christian faith, has been for- 
gotten by those who hold that infant baptism is a complete 
sacrament. They have been betrayed into this forgetful- 
ness by the belief that infant baptism was expressly of 
apostolical origin, and by the consequent pressure of the 
language of Scripture. They found spiritual blessings at- 
tached to baptism in ScrijDture, but they found also spiritual 
conditions imposed upon the recipient. The belief that in- 
fant baptism was the institution then spoken of, involved 
thetn in a hopeless dilemma^ from which they vainly en- 
deavored to extricate themselves by overlooking the spir- 
itual state of the infant, and at the same time supposing 
that God, in some mysterious manner, communicated some 
equally mysterious blessing to his soul. The very essence 
of sacerdotalism was mvolved in this belief. But a mere 
exammation of Scripture has made all clear. The language 
of the Apostolic Church does not apply to infant haptismP 
" The Church indeed advanced * * * to the baptism of in- 
fants, but it neglected, while modifymg the practice, to 
modify the rule w^hich guided the interpretation of Scrip- 
ture respecting it." 

Here, then, we find the same trouble growing out of in- 
fant baptism in Scotland as in Germany. It avowedly re- 



OPElSr COMMUNION". 285 

quires that " the doctrine of Biblical baptism must be re- 
formed^''^ as Bimsen contends. True, in Bible-loving Scot- 
land, this thing can not be quite so openly expressed as in 
Germany. There it is simply termed " modifying the prac- 
tice'''^ of the Bible, and then, to make matters more consist- 
ent, " modifying the rule which guides the interpretation of 
Scripture." But it all means precisely the same thing. It 
is an essential remodeling of Christianity, m one of its 
most important features, the terms of its Church member- 
ship, and of Biblical doctrine itself, to suit such altera- 
tions. It talks about " advancing'''' to the baptism of in- 
fants, beyond all the limits of the Bible, and until it in- 
volves all who practice avowedly in endless confusions and 
contradictions, so that they have to modify and remold all 
the rules Avhich guide their interpretation of the Scriptures 
themselves. 

Thus, whether we examine the defenses of infant baptism 
by Coleridge or Bushnell, by Bunsen or by the " North 
British Review," all concur in showing a fearful list of the 
most injurious consequences accompanying in all ages. 



CHAPTER VI. 

MIXED COIMMUNION UNWISE AND INJURIOUS. 

Many excellent Christians say that they agree with the 
Baptists in every thing but this, that they would like all 
whom they consider Christians admitted to the connn union 
of their Churches. This, as we have seen, is Dr. Bunsen's 
chief objection to them ; he can not see why Pedobaptists 



286 EOBEET hall's 

should refuse to join in Churcli relations mth Baptists, or 
the converse/ 

If Baptists were wrong in regard to this practice, there is 
then nothing to prevent members of Churches, heretofore 
Pedobaptists, behig baptized and forming open comnimi- 
ion Churches in which both of these parties should be on 
terms of perfect equality. Yet neither in this country nor 
m England, that we know of, has a single Pedobaptist 
Church thus altered its character in the last two hundi-ed 
years. In many cases they do j^ractically admit those who 
wiU not have their children sprinkled, and sometimes even 
allow their members to be baptized ; but their creeds re- 
quire a belief that mfant baptism is scriptural, and their 
23reaching upholds it. Their ministers are expected to per- 
form it, and the whole weight and influence of the Church, 
as an organization, is exerted in its favor. 

Many instances have occurred in England of churches 
originally Baptist, carrying open communion sentiments so 
far as to elect Congregational pastors, and even usmg the 
font and the baptistry in the same house of worshij) ; but 
other denominations have never been mclined to meet Bap- 
tists in this matter, justly fearing, no doubt, that it might 
bring all ordmances into contempt. N"or have Pedobaptist 
Churches ever been in the habit of pubHcly inviting, even 
to occasional communion, those who had not in their opin- 
ion been baptized, such as Quakers, etc. That the views 
of such men as Bunyan and Robert Hall arose from a truly 
noble and liberal disposition none can doubt, and many Bap- 
tist Churches have tried the princii3les they proposed. 
Pedobaptists never have, though many have professed to 
adnm-e the arguments of Robert Hall. There is, then, no 
^ See p. 16, and Hippolytus, vol. iii. p. 215. 



SYSTEM. 287 

justice in the charge so often made against the Baptist de- 
nomination for iUiberahty in not accomphshing what its 
members alone have attempted to effect. Where is the 
Church, origmally Pedobaptist, that has felt itself con- 
strained to admit all pious persons, even if unbaptized, to 
the Lord's Suj)per, to a full and perfect membership in any 
numbers, with an equal right to vote, even to elect officers, 
or to become officers themselves, as well as to preach and 
administer ordinances only as they conscientiously believed 
correct ? 

If this were the divinely appointee principle of visible 
Church membership, Pedobaptists ought not, in any way, to 
require infant baptism or any particular form of government 
in their Churches. The revolution which would then take 
place in other denominations would be quite as great as any 
proposed in our own. When they have tried this experi- 
ment and succeeded in it, they may blame us perhaps for 
bigotry. But until then the case stands thus — some Bap- 
tists have, from the most liberal views, tried it, but it has 
not been found conducive to prosperity, and many of them 
deny that it is correct in principle. Robert Hall advocated 
this plan on the only equitable and reasonable basis. He 
says that were the practice he proposed universally to pre- 
vail, " the mixture of Baptists and Pedobaptists in Christian 
societies would probably, ere long, be such that the appel- 
lation of Baptist might be found not so properly applicable 
to Churches as to individuals." ^ And he calls this his lead- 
ing position, " that no Church has a right to establish terms 
of communion which are not terms of salvation."^ Indeed 
he would make it a matter of indiffiLU'cnce whether tlie min- 
isters of the Gospel were themselves bajDtized or unbaptized, 
^ Works, vol. ii. p. 228. Harper. 2 Works, vol. i. p. 359. 



288 HISTOEY OF THE 

or what theii' vieTTS were upon any subject of theology, 
proYicled they were esteemed to be Christians. 

The following is the history of this whole question. Be- 
fore the year 1600, seyeral of the Puritans who had left 
England and jouied the BroT\iiists or Independent Church 
in Holland became Baptist, there being many of that per- 
suasion around them^ For this " they icere excommimi- 
catecl hy the rest:^ ^ This led to the formation of an Eng- 
lish Baptist Church in Holland, which afterward moyed 
back and settled in London. Before this time the practice 
of English Baptists seems to haye been yarious. There 
were some Churches distinctiyely Baptist, and there were 
Baptists, at least in sentiment, mixed up in other churches. 
Cert am it is that m 1633, in an Independent Church, enough 
of its oyii members, who did not belieye in infant baptism, 
asked and received their dismissions to form a distinct 
Church on Baptist principles. 

It is probably owing to circumstances such as these that 
some of the churches in England became mixed commu- 
nion and some strict. TThen Bunyan wrote in defense of 
the former practice it was not, however, general in the de- 
nomination, nor did it become so, until the influence of Rob- 
ert Hall's writings gave it a currency in England it has 
never obtained in this country. For a time the splendor 
of his essays on this subject dazzled and delighted all. And 
by degrees the practice he recommended became exceed- 
ingly current in the Baptist Churches of that country. To 
such lengths were matters carried, that many openly de- 
clared themselves not Baptist Churches in any sense of the 
word, or attached to any particular denomination, but sim- 
ply Christian. Sprinkhng and immersion were performed in 
^ See Struggles and Triumphs, p. 197. 



QUESTIOI^^. 289 

the same house of worship, as they are in some of these 
places to this day. Pedobaptist ministers were called and 
settled as pastors when the nmnbers of persons of that per- 
suasion became the majority, as they must frequently in a 
country where the proportion of Baptists is so exceedingly 
small. They were sometimes preferred as able and willing 
to accommodate all parties, which Baptists could not. The 
result of this was found to be that Avhile Baptist Churches 
lost their distinctive character and influence, the Pedobap- 
tist Churches lost none of theirs. And thus the question 
naturally evolved itself, whether it was the duty — whether 
it was rights in fact, in those who conscientiously believed 
in Baptist sentiments, to give up so powerful a source of 
influence in their favor as that of church organization. The 
result seems to have been very generally a practical convic- 
tion, even in the minds of all English open communionists, 
that the Pedobaptists and Regular Baptists of this country 
were right so fhr as this at least, that the maintenance of 
the ordinance of Baptism is committed in charge to the 
visible churches as such — that it is one of the specific ob- 
jects for which they were instituted and that they may not 
lay aside this means of extending their influence. 

Hence most of the English Churches now do not allow 
Pedobaptists to become fully members of the Church in 
the sense of voting or having any share in the government, 
but simply to commune. Thus the Church is Baptist 
though the communicants may be half Pedobaptist. This 
is a quiet but complete abandonment of Robert Hall's 
theory, and of the principle of mixed communion, while re- 
taining its practice. For it is quite clear that the maintenance 
of the two ordinances devolves on the same body of luen. 
If baptism is committed to visible Churches J^s sucl), so isi 

13 



290 BAPTISTS 12^ a:3j:ekica. 

also tlie Lord's Supper, and they are hoth Church ordi- 
nances. The only possible question is, whether occasional 
participation ought or ought not to be goTerned by the 
principles T\'hich regulate habitual Church communion. 

In this country there never has been the same hesitation 
on these questions, owing m part to the more rapid manner 
in which all jDractices are here pushed back mitil they rest 
upon their ultimate i^rmciples, and are carried out to then' 
legithnate consequences. Another cause more immediately 
historical is that in their early orighi in this country, the 
Baptists were driven off by the action of theii* opponents, 
excluded on the j^lea of anabaptism from their Church fel- 
lowshijD, and thus forced mto the position of uniting as 
an entirely distinct denomiuation. The earhest Baptist 
Churches were in this way formed by the action of Pedo- 
bajDtists who drove them together by banishing those who 
embraced these views alike from their Churches and from 
their colonies, and pmiishedthem for preachmg in their cities 
or being found m their streets. The Churches thus formed 
grew, because they were founded on principles of truth and 
of enormous, though imj^erceived, importance to all vital 
Christianity. It was soon found also that the very exclu- 
sion of them from other communions, by driAdng them into 
Church relations with each other, enabled them niore fully 
to preach, act out and practice ujDon their principles. This 
was the means of a combmed strength and rai3id propaga- 
tion of their ^dews by that inmiensely sujDerior force which 
every social organization has over an equal number of men 
unorganized — and above all by that vrhich the 23resence of 
the Saviour confers upon every two or three gathered to- 
gether m his name. 

In the course of time good men became imited in Masr 



THE PKACTICAL QUESTIOiN". 291 

sachusetts, and by degrees all over the country tlie preju- 
dices against tliem gave way, until now the chief complaint 
against them is that of Bunsen, that they remain a distinct 
denomination. 

The question, therefore, has resolved itself into this prac- 
tically, having by the providence of God, and the action of 
others, been formed on principles of organization, very 
powerful for the dissemination of what they are convinced 
are important truths, is it now their duty to alter these 
principles so as to surrender that peculiar power, especially 
while all Pedobaptist Churches retain it on their side, and 
apply it to the support of mfant baptism ? 

But apart from the danger of forsaking a position in 
which they are placed by Providence, and endorsed by the 
course of all others, the fact which has ultimately decided 
their position is, that the ordinances of baptism and the 
Lord's Supper being committed to the visible Churches of 
Christ, as such, for maintenance and extension, it is their 
duty to throw their whole proper weight as a divine institu- 
tion, in favor of the correct and regular observance of both 
these sacraments. But this is impossible, if they associate 
themselves on an equality in the visible Churches, with those 
whose belief, practice, and influence are erroneous on these 
subjects, and paralyze their own. Hence, in tliis country 
it seems to be generally admitted as a truth, that without 
loving each other less, all Christians can act more efficient- 
ly by resolving themselves into churches, constituted on 
their own views in regard to tliose Divine ordinances which 
it is part of the duty of tliose organizations as such, to 
uphold. 

If infant baptism is a divine institution, the Pedobaptists 
are right in preaching about it, and practicing it as a visible 



292 ALL OTHER CHUECHES 

Church ordinance, and the best way of testing the matter 
is for all those who conscientiously believe thus, to carry it 
out in action to its legitimate results. On the other hand, 
if believer's baptism is alone divinely appointed, if Baptist 
principles have the distinctive power and utility which has 
been shown, it is not only the right but the duty of all who 
believe these truths, to act up to them by uniting in 
churches, the weight of whose public and social influence 
is in favor of all those objects for which particular churches 
are organized at all. 

To carry out any other principles, every Presbyterian and 
Congregational, and Methodist Church must give up all the 
denominational peculiarities of its organization. Baptists 
ought to be admitted to a full and hearty equality in all 
evangelical Churches — admitted, not only as members but 
as officers, and allowed to preach their views and act out 
their sentiments, as freely and fully as Pedobaptists, or with 
such differences only as fluctuating majorities might rightly 
impose upon conscientious minorities in the same Church, 
all having equal privileges of opinion and of voting. In 
fine, it would do away with every thing like a constitution 
derived from the New Testament, beyond the simjDle fact 
that each person must be a society of those supposed to be 
pious persons, however heterogeneous their views. This 
might be a Church of Christians then, but would not be a 
Church of Christ. The whims, opinions, and heresies of 
good men, however dangerous, would all be entitled to 
equal support. Augustine believed in baptismal regenera- 
tion, and Fenelon in purgatory. Foster shrank from end- 
less punishment, while Milton advocated divorce at pleasure, 
and Massillon adored the Virgin Mary. Must we then 
either deny the personal Christianity of such men as these, 



II 



SIMIL.\ELY CONSTITUTED. 293 

or admit any numbers of tliem if supposed to be pious, who 
may wish to join all our churches as members or ministers, 
to advocate any of these views ? Are they to have liberty 
not only to advocate them, but to act them out, to seek 
the intercessions of samts and virgins, to baptize children, 
or pray for the dead ? Must we have a quiet corner for 
the confessional, mth an altar and a crucifix to conciliate 
the conscientious PajDist ? Must we alter the marriage vow, 
and provide for its amicable termination, to accommodate 
the disciples of Milton ? And yet it would all necessarily 
follow from mixed communion principles, as stated by Rob- 
ert Hall himself, in that " we are expressly commanded to 
tolerate in the Church those diversities of opinions which 
are not inconsistent with salvation." ^ 

When the Churches of other denominations are prepared 
for this, they may rightly complain. At present, the Con- 
stitution of all Pedobaptist Churches pledges their mem- 
bers individually, and the whole weight and moral influence 
of the Church collectively, to the sujoport of infant bap- 
tism. In the Episcopal Church, meager as its articles are 
in regard to many other parts of ecclesiastical polity, they 
yet particularly specify that infant baptism " is in any wise 
to be retained in the Church." (Art. 27.) 

Our Methodist brethren have the same article in sub- 
stance (Art. 17), and it is made " the duty of every minis- 
ter of a circuit, or station, to obtain the names of the chil- 
dren belonging to his congregation, * * * and diHgently 
to instruct and exhort all parents to dedicate their children 
to the Lord in baptism, as early as convenient." In an- 
swer to the question, "How improper persons shall be kept 
from joining the Church ?" the answer is, " Let none be 
^ Terms of Communion, part ii. sec. 2. 



294 OPEX co:y:Muxiox 

received into the Church until they are recommended by a 
leader, ^ith whom they have met at least six months on 
trial, and have been baptized, and shall, on examination by 
the leader in charge, before the Chmxh, give satisfactory 
assurances both of the correctness of then* faith and their 
willingness to observe and keep the rules of the Church." ^ 

Among the Presbyterians, both theii* Confession of Faith 
and then' Larger and Shorter Catechisms declare that " the 
infants of such as are members of the visible Church are to 
he 'baptized.'''' In theii' form of government^ they utterly 
set themselves against the principles on which alone mixed 
communion could be advocated, and declare that all their 
baptized members of the Church are " bound to perform 
all the duties of Church members." ^ 

It would not even be suflicient for Pedobaptists simply 
to be willing to break down their church walls so far as to 
receive Baptists to a full and perfect equahty in the 
Church, in order to make the cases parallel, seeing that 
they fully admit the baptisms of these latter, who, how- 
ever, are unable to acknowledge theii's. 

The following objections to mixed communion will be 
felt both by conscientious Pedobaptists and Baptists. 

1. If it were siraply lawful.^ and not absolutely coimnand- 
ed^ it icould he inedpedient., as calculated to make all ordi- 
nances obsolete^ by brmging them into contempt. Whether 
the notion be scriptural or otherwise, it always has been 
supj^osed that the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's 
supper belong appropriately to the visible Churches of Christ, 
as such. The Lord-s SujDper, for instance, is celebrated in 
the Church as a general rule, and members are commanded 

^ Discipline, chap, il sec. 2. 

^ Book i. chap. i. ii. and Book ii. of Discipline, chap L 



INEXPEDIENT. 295 

" to tarry one for another." Both ordinances are adminis- 
tered by the presiding officer of the Church, specially to 
intimate that it is performed as an official act of him, as 
their minister. What then, must he the effect, if, in the 
same body, all kinds of different views in regard to the 
ordinances prevail ? Either there would be perpetual bick- 
erings, or else complete and compelled silence, leading to 
indifference. The latter, as the only course of equitable 
peace, would soon prevail. The Baptist conscientiously be- 
lieves infant sjDrinkling to be invalid to the individual and 
injurious to the religious community. The Pedobaptist 
would dislike to sanction the baptism of an adult who had 
been sprinkled in infancy, esteeming it an improper repeti- 
tion of the ordinance — a?za-baptism. The officers of a 
church, anxious not to Avound the feelings of any brethren, 
would keep these occasions of difference out of sight ; 
neither mfant baptism nor that of adults would be upheld 
•from the pulpit. The duty of submission to the rite in 
anyway would cease to be enjoined. It w^ould be shimned 
as a matter of conversation generally among members, or 
those who spoke freely about it would be liable to discip- 
line for disturbing the peace of the Church. Thus baptism, 
that ordinance which is placed so conspicuously in the ISTew 
Testament, would necessarily be treated mth utter disre- 
gard — ^banished the Churches. 

But if expelled the Church, where could it find a home ? 
For that, as we have seen, is its appropriate place. It has 
thus far ever been administered as the official act of the 
Church ; but its officers would feel that they were never 
acting in the name of the whole Church, but of a divided 
body, let them administer it as tliey miglit. Tliey would 
hardly like to perform it, and when done, it would be al- 



296 OPEX communio:n" 

most by stealth. But if the spnit of the Church really 
discountenanced any form of baptism within its walls, aU 
baptism would certainly be despised and become obsolete, 
and this with very far more rapidity than infant baptism 
itself, fostered by Churches and upheld by ministers, has 
yet done. Thus, from an ostensible regard for the Lord's 
Supper, all baptism would be discarded. 

But this would be certain to react upon the Lord's Sup- 
per itself. A body which avowed itself not called on to 
defend the one institution, could find no authority to en- 
force the other. If the Church, as such, is not an institu- 
tion appointed to uphold baptism, it has no more authority 
in regard to the Lord's Supper. The whole Avould be a 
private matter, perfectly optional, observed only by a few 
of the stricter brethren, and all ordinances, and of course 
all disciplme, disjointed and disunited, would drop to pieces 
as a rope of sand. 

2. But, beyond all this, the principle upon which mixed 
communion rests involves a breach of trusty because bap- 
tism and the Lord's Supper are committed to the custody 
and guardianship of the visible Churches of Christ, as such, 
which are the trustees, the administrators of these ordi- 
nances, by a divine aj)pointment. 

It must be quite evident that they are committed to the 
care of some agents. They are not simply enjoined in the 
Bible, and left without any to defend them, against abuses 
and attacks, or to exhibit their divine authority and the 
duty of submitting to them, none being responsible for 
administering them to proper subjects, and to those alone. 
On whom does this responsibihty officially devolve ? We 
know that one hnportant duty of the visible Churches of 
Christ is to uphold the doctrmes of the Gospel, and to 



A BREACH OF TRUST. 297 

spread them before the whole world. It is thus that they 
exhibit their character as the golden candlesticks supporting 
the light of divine truth in the world, trimmed and filled 
with the oil of grace by the hand of Christ himself But 
is it only doctrines that give light ? Is there nothing 
luminous in the ordinances of the Gospel ? To whom tlien 
is the maintenance of these institutions committed? Whose 
duty is it to uphold and to administer them, but those 
Churches of Christ regularly constituted, according to the 
institution of the Gospel ? 

If we consider baptism, for instance, who can doubt that 
the visible Churches were intended, among other objects, 
to support and maintain this ordinance. Such certainly 
has been the instinctive feeling of Christians in all ages. 
When first the commission was given to preach and to bap- 
tize, there was but one visible Church on earth. And the 
commission seems to have been delivered twice. First to 
the eleven privately ; at which time Christ does not say 
any thing specifically about the administrator of baptism, 
only its administration.^ Secondly on one of the mountains 
of Galilee, where he met with his disciples, by a solemn and 
long-standing appointment. There were clearly, on this 
last occasion, many others present besides the eleven, some 
of whom up to that time doubted. This is probably the 
occasion on which he met the ^yq hundred brethren at 
once, as Robinson has shown.'^ "He therefore" says this 
sound critic, " here takes leave on earth of those among 
whom he had lived and labored longest, and repeats to all 
his disciples, in public, the solemn charge which he had al- 
ready given in private to the Apostles, ' Go yo, therefore, 
and teach all nations, and lo, I am with 3'Ou always, even 

* Mark, xvi. 16. 2 Notes to English Harmony, § 170. 

13* 



298 OKDIXANCES COMMITTED TO 

unto the end of the ^vo^ld.' " ^ This commission, then, ap- 
pears to have been given to the visibk? Churches as such. 

Afterward when the first great missionary enterprise was 
imdertaken, Acts, xiii. 1, although St. Paul as an Apostle of 
Christ was to be an officer in the Churches among all na- 
tions, it was still to the Church at Antioch that the Spirit 
said " separate unto me Barnabas and Saul," and to it they 
returned and gave an account of their labors. So that dur- 
ing the life-time and service of these extraordinary minis- 
ters it was still through the Churches that the work of con- 
ducting even missionary operations and baptisms was 
conducted. 

It has by many been supposed that baptism was specifi- 
cally committed to the ministry as such. If this were con- 
ceded, the question would then arise if it was not committed 
to them as officers of the visible Churches. The xVpostles 
indeed might have claimed a more direct commission. But 
they were extraordinary officers connected with the first 
establishment of Christianity, and have left no successors. 
All the distinctive} powers of ministry now come to them 
through the relations they sustain to the visible Churches. 
This is clearly the case in regard to pastors and deacons, 
neither of whom have any pecuhar prerogatives in any 
other Church than their own, except h\j courtesy and invita- 
tio?i / not of right. Evangelists have been considered offi- 
cers rather appointed to labor outside the bounds of any 
Church for the conversion of the world. But still they are 
always called to engage in this work by some visible Church 
of which they are members, through whom their credentials 
are received. Indeed originally every Church member, as 
such, was an Evangelist wherever he could be. Acts, viii. 4. 

* Page 216. 



THE VISIBLE CHUBCHES. 299 

As l^eander has shown, and all early Church history proves, 
the distinction between the clergy and laity was much less 
marked at first than it afterward became.^ In regard to 
the administration of baptism, this was quite as much the 
case as teaching. It belonged to the original priesthood of 
all, at first, or was at least committed to them except as 
limited by the Church. 

The Apostles seem to have avoided the administration of 
it themselves. Peter commanded Cornelius to be baptized 
by some of those brethren who accompanied him instead of 
administering it himself. Hillary, in the fourth century, 
commenting on Eph. iv. 11, 12, says, "at first, before 
Churches were CA^ery where established, all taught and all 
baptized ;" and again he says, " it was conceded to all to 
evangelize and to baptize." As Mosheim says, " at first all 
who were engaged in propagating Christianity admmistered 
this rite, nor can it be called in question that whoever per- 
suaded any person to embrace Christianity could baptize 
his own disciple. But when the Churches became more 
regulated and provided with rules of order, the bishop alone 
exercised the right of baptizing." ^ But then the bishop or 
pastor could not do it against the voice of the Church, 
of which he was head, and whose consent to it was al- 
ways either expressed or implied, so that it was by or 
through the Churches that the baptism was administered. 
During the early persecutions none but those who were fit 
would desire baptism ; hence it needed but little discretion 
and the Church gave impliedly a general commission to 
each of its disciples to administer the rite in its behalf Af- 
terward more care was needed, and it was restricted to the 

1 See also Merle D'Aubigne's Hist. Reform, vol. i. pp. 16, V\. 
^ Cent. 1, pai-t ii. chap. iv. sec. 8. 



300 THE co]y:MON law 

cMef officers of the Cliurcli. But in all this the Church 
really administered the rite, the individual only acted as its 
organ. 

But if noT^' Christ has committed this ordinance to the 
%isible Churches and given them on earth the dutv of main- 
taining it, then it is contrary to the most ob^ ious principles 
of common sense that a Church should do right in admit- 
thig in any numbers and to an equal share of the govern- 
ment those who neglect m practice and even ojDpose on 
princi^Dle that which Baptists have sho^Ti alone to be true 
baptism. So far then from its being true as Robert Hall 
contends, and as many suppose, that we are " expressly com- 
manded to tolerate in the Church all those diversities of 
opinion which are not inconsistent ^yiih salvation," some of 
the very objects for which visible Churches were founded, 
must be utterly frustrated by the adoption of this principle. 

IsTo i^erson doubts that in primitive thnes every one was 
bajDtized prior to being admitted to the Lord's table or the 
Church. The Bev. Bajjtist Xoel gave it as his own rea- 
son for submitting to this ordinance, that to approach the 
Lord's table conscious of not bemg baptized " would be to 
act contrary to all the j)recedents of Scripture," and Bobert 
Hall concedes that "the members of the primitive Churches 
consisted of only such as were baptized." 

The only question is whether all this was a mere casual 
circumstance as Robert Hall contends, or whether it was 
from an instituted connection. Surely v\'hat we have sho^\Ti 
above proves it to have been a part of the great common 
laio of primitive Christianity ; a custom that arose in the 
divine will, and had in it all the force of a fundamental con- 
stitution, since it is clearly essential to one of the purposes 
for which Churches were established, L 6., the perpetua- 



OF PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANITY. 301 

tion of baptism by precept, example, and administration. 
This connection is obvious in the nature of things. 

To all this but one objection has ever been suggested. 
In the minds of many, there is the idea of a body interme- 
diate as it were between the separate visible Churches of 
Christ and "The Universal Church," which is invisible. 
This body they sometimes call " the Universal Church vis- 
ible," and it is supposed to consist of all those who make 
a credible proj-ession of the Christian religion throughout 
the world, whether they possess it or not. To this body 
rather than the smaller separate bodies they suppose the 
ordinances to be in truth committed. 

There can be no objection to the figurative conception of 
such a body by throwing all the separate Churches into one, 
just as a Gibbon might speak of the " several detachments of 
that immense army of ISTorthern barbarians," which in the 
course of successive centuries overran Southern Europe. 
Yet as in such a case we should not conceive of a body un- 
der one general, or in fact, any more one than as actuated 
by a common purpose which moved distinct tribes and or- 
ganizations, so we can not accurately speak of any one visi- 
ble earthly Church, having constitution, officers and pow- 
ers separate from the visible Churches which are each inde- 
pendent bodies. This Robert Hall has fully admitted.^ 

To any idea of a proper Church Universal Visible, there 
are overwhelming objections. There is not any such body 
and never has been since the scattering of the iirst Church 
in Jerusalem. Even at the resurrection we shall be re- 
ceived according to our membership or otherwise in the 
invisible Church. Not by the profession of religion, but its 
possession. 

* Terms of Communion, part 2, sec. 3. 



302 THE CHURCH FI^IYERSAL. 

If there were any such body, it would be without any 
government, or assembhes, or discipHne, or yisible organi- 
zation. So that it can only exist as an imagmary rather 
than a real power — a body vaguely conceived of, but the 
limitations of Avhose membership are variously viewed by 
every different Christian A\ithout any being more certainly 
correct than the other. It would be in fact no more one 
and the same body, than the rainbow which a thousand per- 
sons stationed at different points might behold at one time. 
Each would see but one bow, but no two would behold the 
same. 

Whoever will look mto Church history will find that 
though the idea of a Church Universal Visible was an error 
which commenced very early, yet it originated in confound- 
ing the outward profession of religion with its inward 
reception — visible Churches with the Church invisible ; and 
that it was from this confusion all the worst errors of Popery 
naturally and necessarily evolved themselves. This idea, 
revived by Dr. Pusey, has carried back several into the 
bosom of the Church of Pome, and multitudes to her 
gates. 

It has been a matter of dispute between Presbyterians 
and Congregationalists if the term Church {eaxlrioUx) is 
ever used in the sense of a Visible Church Universal as dis- 
tmct from the Church invisible in the Xew Testament. 
Robinson in his Lexicon of the Xew Testament makes no 
distinction of the kind. The chief passages fiworable to 
such a view are considered in my work on communion.^ If 
the term is ever so used either in the Xew Testament or by 
us, it can only be in a figurative manner. 

Baptism is, therefore an ordinance, the duty of perpetu- 
' Pages 282-4. 



/ 



1 COR. XI. 18-34. 803 

ating which is committed to the visible Chm^ches as such. 
But a Church by receiving unbaptized persons to their 
membership incapacitates itself for rightly fulfilling this 
trust, as we have seen. 

And if this be true of baptism, how much more obviously 
true is it of the Lord's Supper. It in like manner is a 
visible Church ordinance, one in which the members are on 
this account commanded to "tarry one for another." To these 
Churches, as such, the injunction is addressed to " do this^'' 
in remembrance of Christ. The whole regulating power in 
regard to it is clearly committed to them^ such as deciding 
when and where it shall be administered, who shall and 
who shall not participate. They are to put away the im- 
pure and receive back the penitent, to exhort and urge the 
doubting and the lingering, and by preaching and example 
perpetuate the celebration of this ordinance to the end of 
time. Let any one read, in the most cursory manner, 1 
Corinthians, xi. 18-34, and he will see the full proof and 
illustration of all this. The Church is there spoken of as 
"coming together" in assembly to eat the Supper,^ and 
those as " despising the Church" ^ who conduct improp- 
erly in that ordinance. And the Apostle declares to 
the Church at Corinth that he had " delivered'^'' it into their 
charge just as he had received it into his, as an Apostle of 
the Lord Jesus. ^ 

It is not only committed to their care, but is to be admin- 
istered among them as a symbol among other things of that 
fraternity which they bear to each other as such. It there- 
fore unquestionably indicates visible church relations as sub- 
sisting among all who by right unite together in its cele- 
bration. 

> Verse 18. * Verse 22. ^ Verse 23. 



304 A DISTINCTIOlSr CONSIDERED. 

Occasional communion by invitation must follow there- 
fore the principles established for the regular celebration of 
this ordinance. We may not bend the rule to the excep- 
tion, but the exception to the rule. And yet the whole 
charge of intolerance, brought against the Baptists by 
other denominations, must rest upon just this basis, and no 
other, ^. 6., that they do not make an exception in favor of 
irregularity, or break down well-established and admitted 
general principles to accommodate exceptional occasions. 

A distinction is attempted sometimes to be drawn between 
an admission to participate with us at the Lord's Table, and 
an admission to fellowship with us in the same Church. '' It 
is the Ziord^s Table," it is urged, " and hence we dare not 
deny any who are the Lord's children." But would the 
same persons be willing to carry this out to its legitimate 
conclusion, that it is our Church and not the Lord^s^ seeing 
that we may refuse to admit to the one those whom we are 
bound to receive to the other. No, surely it is the Lord's 
Table and it is the Lord's Church. Both are given by 
Christ for specific purposes, and the former is among other 
things the symbol of the other. The symbol can not be ap- 
propriate where the thing signified is wanting, and hence even 
occasional communion must follow the regulations of Church 
membership. Robert Hall cheerfully admits this through- 
out the whole discussion." ^ 

* Our Methodist brethren seem to admit the principle in their Book of 
Disciphne:^ "No person shall be admitted to the Lord's Supper among 
■Qs who is guilty of any practice for which we would exclude a member 
of the Church." 

The Old School Presbyterian General Assembly admitted it fully a few 
years ago, when being invited to unite with the New School body at the 
Lord's Table, with whom they had dissolved tlieir former ecclesiastical 



1. Chap. L sec. 23, 8. 



1 



EVANGELICAL ALLIANCES. 305 

Baptists simply regard the Lord's Supper as a visible 
Church ordinance, and those who partake by special invita- 
tion, as members for the time being, not destroying or al- 
tering the ecclesiastical character of the feast, nor making 
it as many loosely suppose it, a mere local celebration of 
membership in the Church universal, either invisible or 
visible. They do not wish to facilitate the extension of an 
error which has broken down the original liberties of Christ's 
Churches, and hatched Popery. They therefore repudiate 
in common with very many PedobajDtists, every thing which 
involves such mischief. 

We may, to make this distinction more clear, regard the 
evangelical movements of the present day, the Bible and 
Tract Societies, Evangelical Alliances, and Young Men's 
Christian Associations, as partial embodiments of this sup- 
posed visible Church Catholic. By what instinct is it then 
that so uniformly at their anniversaries while their members 
unite in demonstrations of Christian fellowship, they do 
not esteem it appropriate to unite in celebrating the Lord's 
Supper. It is because they have instinctively felt that by 
so doing they would be in symbol forming themselves into 
a visible Church, and so interfere with the ecclesiastical ar- 
rangements of their various bodies. It is not for want of 
Christian fellowship, nor does it even assert that they do 
not esteem each other worthy of a place at the Lord's 

connections, tlioy declined to do so, substantially upon this very j^round. 
And yet how many persons assail the Baptists as uncharitable, not f<:>r 
regulating their Church membership as they do, and as all do, but for not 
inviting to commune with them those wliom they could not welcome to 
their churches. To Baptists it seems that such invitations, whore ex- 
tended, must appear like ostentatiously inviting a neighbor into the 
piazza, but carefully shutting the door of the house. 



306 THE ANCIENT OPINION. 

Table in their owii cliurclies. All we ask is, that our ab- 
stainino; from iinitino: ^Yith other denominations in that or- 
dmance, may not be more harshly construed by our Chris- 
tian brethren than their own in the circumstance named. 
We have the more right to expect this, as in our own de- 
nominational Associations and Conventions, and missionary 
anniversaries, we never unite in any of those capacities in 
celebrating the Lord's Supper. If it is done at all, it is 
by the invitation of the Church with which we meet. This 
is not because we doubt the fitness of our o^vn brethren, 
certainly, for the ordinance in question, but because we 
consider the Lord's SujDper as belonging specifically to 
visible churches as such, and would guard against the idea 
of symbohcally clothing our voluntary associations with 
Church authority. 

This is no modern opinion. There are proofs abundant 
that it is the primitive view of the Lord's Supper, long j)re- 
served even after the idea of a Catholic Church visible had 
seriously afiected the independence of churches. From 
the tune when the Ignatian Epistles were written, down 
for several centuries, the motto of " but one altar to a 
church," even where that church embraced in fact several 
congregations, was in practical operation. And the care 
with which it was managed that each distmct visible bishop- 
ric or church should have its own altar, or place where 
alone the Eucharist might be consecrated, is a clear proof 
that it was esteemed an original and important truth, that the 
Lord's Supper was an ordinance committed and belonging 
to the visible Churches, as distinct from any one universal 
visible Church.^ There is, as we have seen, in 1 Corin- 

* See Bingham's Christian Antiquities, book viii. chap. vi. sect. 16, 17 ; 
Curtis on Communion, 89, 90. 



CHURCHES AGGEESSIYE BODIES. 307 

thians, xi. 18-34, direct proof that this idea belongs orig- 
inally to the 'New Testament, and is in fact part of that 
universal usage which marks it as one of the most radical 
elements of the constitution of the churches. 

Thus, then, it is clear that the Lord's Supper is given in 
charge to those visible Churches of Christ, in the midst of 
which he has promised to walk and dwell. Rev. ii. 1. To 
each of these it belongs to celebrate it as one family. The 
members of that particular Church are to be tarried for, 
and it is to be a symbol of their relations, as members, to 
each other. Other things are no doubt signified also, but 
this none the less. In all ordinary cases, it should be par- 
taken of by each Christian in the particular Church of which 
he is a member. Here is the home of ordinances, and this 
is one of the purposes for which these bodies are instituted ; 
not alone for the defense of Gospel doctrines, but for the 
advocacy and celebration of Gospel ordinances. 

What is more, the guardianship of these rites is commit- 
ted to them alone. If they neglect it, there are no other 
persons to supply their lack in discharging this duty. 
What then can be more certain than that their own united 
obedience and hearty belief in them must be preserved ? 
Nor are they at liberty to enter into any compromise or 
deviations from the original practice of the Church, which 
shall impair their capacity for fulfilling these purposes of 
their institution. 

It is one of the specific objects of their imion to uphold 
these things as aggressive bodies, and not merely as recep- 
tive. The power of organized bodies of men to propagate 
any truth, or revive one that has been overlooked, is natu- 
rally immense. It emboldens the timid and decides the 
wavering. It incites to action, because it exhibits truth in 



308 UNION OF FAITH AND SYMBOL. 

action. Another and a greater source of power is the 
present and indwelling Spirit of Christ. A Church, there- 
fore, is both a human and a divine institution. As in man, 
by the union of soul and body, one person is formed, of 
powers greater than many unitedly would possess with but 
one of these alone, so is each visible Church of Christ en- 
dowed with resources, strength, and influence illimitable for 
good, and far transcending the sum of its individual human 
poAvers. Its eifect on the customs of society, for instance, 
are incalculable. The morals and manners of a nation, and 
of an age, its intelligence, even its form of government, 
will generally have their archetype in the congregations of 
its saints. 

He who has given to these bodies their peculiar strength 
— who first applied the power of voluntary social organiza- 
tion to religious purposes in His own Churches, and has 
guarded, guided, and actuated that power ever since, — He 
has committed two sacramental ordinances specially to their 
care. Baptism and the Lord's Supper. These, as mere out- 
Avard signs, might seem of little importance ; but that He 
has connected with them, in a remarkable manner, a whole 
system of doctrines and practice, of which Pie has made 
them the symbols and exiDonents, to which indeed He has 
imited them in a unique manner, so that practically the 
severing^ of them should no more be thouo-ht of than the 
disuniting of the body and the soul. He has made it 
the duty of these organizations to convert the world to 
this system of Christianity, in all its wholeness, just as He 
delivered it to them, the parts balanced like the various 
parts of man, and adjusted by His own hand. They have 
no right to i^roclaim baptism or the Lord's Supper without 
the faith they symbolize, nor yet, on the other hand, the 



4 



THE CHURCH AND THE I5IBLE. 309 

faith without the symbols. The body without the soul is 
a mere carcass. And the soul without the body is too 
ethereal — it can not be realized in the present state. Sym- 
bol is the appointed dwelling-place for piety, as the body 
for the spirit. 

To the churches Christianity is thus committed in its 
symmetry and wlioleness. Tlie Bible is indeed its text- 
book and standard. But each church is a limng body to 
which the Saviour has given in cliarge both the oracles 
and ordinances. It is for these churches to draw sustenance 
from the Scriptures and propagate the system of life they 
fmd througli the whole eartli, by their divine powers, exam- 
ple, and organization. "Ye are My witnesses, saith the 
Lord." " Ye are the light of the world." 

The Church and the Bible stand in the same position to 
the guilty dying world that tlie physician and his books 
stand to the sick patient. The patient looks upon the phy- 
sician as the living embodiment of his books. So the shi- 
ner looks to the Church as the authorized exponent of what 
Christianity, as a system, is. Whether rightly or wrongly, 
each Church of Christ is thus regarded by the great masses 
of men. From this they derive far more of their relig- 
ious ideas tlian from any other source. These two ordi- 
nances, then, should be upheld by the churches hi living ex- 
hibition, just in the same position as they are placed in the 
New Testament, and all must admit that they stand very 
prominently in the sacred volume. 

The admixture of Baptists and Pedobaptists in the same 
Church would be a great hinderance to hoth. All agree 
that it is a duty of visible churches as such to uphold bap- 
tism to the best of their knowledge and power, although 
not uniting as to the nature and subjects of baptism. But 



310 INDIFFEEEIN-CE TO OEDINAXCES 

mixed communion climxlies are formed upon the basis of 
being neutral on the whole question, and thus the very 
principle of their organization is diametrically opposed to 
one great object for which they are constituted. These 
ends will not be accomplished by uniting those who differ 
at the zero of indifference in regard to ordinances. The 
truth T^ill best finally be exhibited by each accomplishing 
separately what they conceive to be theii' respective mis- 
sions, and maintaining the truth in love: 



The author is aware that in some of the pages of this 
last chapter, and throughout the whole of the Second Book, 
he may seem not to have confined hmiself simply, to the 
hne of tracmg what the actual progress has been of Baptist 
princij^les, but, in addition, of showing what he esteems 
it logically ought to have been. But the careful reader 
will mark to what extent the Pedobaptist authorities 
alluded to, sustain him in this opinion, or in other words, 
concede the jDomts at issue. Just where one writer fails to 
do this, others have more than suiDplied the deficiency. It 
must also be borne m mind that it would be impossible fully 
to show the importance of each concession, except by also 
exhibiting how little it left unacknowledged, and the nar- 
row and untenable nature of the position to which the 
opponents of further progress or practical adhesion to Bap- 
tist views were reduced. 

Let any one consider the concessions made during the 
past hundred years by such men as Campbell, Stuart, and 
Robinson, as to the meaning of ^octijI'qm^ or as to the effect of 
the j)repositions and the circumstances and figures con- 
nected with the administration of Baptism. In the chapter 



NOT CHRISTIAI!^ UNION. 311 

on the importance of that rite, the author has inserted 
more of his own ideas than elsewhere. But let any one 
consider the rapid success of Puseyism as an illustration of 
the importance of a correct observance of ordinances, by 
showing the results of erroneous views of them, and by the 
certainty of a fearful reaction from the neglect of the posi- 
tive institutions of Christianity. Let him consider the con- 
cessions of Coleridge, Bushnell, Bunsen, and the " JSJ'orth 
British Review" as to what inconsistencies, and injurious 
effects have ever arisen out of infant baptism ; and the testi- 
monies that have been exhibited in various ways by all 
Christian denominations — that the ordinances of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper are committed to the visible 
churches as such, and he will see how little there is left 
which is now a matter of fair controversy at all. 



BOOK III. 

PRINCIPLES ALWAYS HELD IN CO:^MON. 

Ix order now to perfect our ^iew of the progress of BajD- 
tist principles during the last hundred years, we must mark 
the advance of a third class of ojmiions, namely, those 
which Baptists yet hold m common with other evangelical 
Christians, but which require the acknowledgment of 
Baptist principles to be advocated with force and consist- 
ency. Some of these are the Sufficiency of Holy Scrip- 
ture as a rule of faith and practice ; Salvation by grace 
alone ; and the essential Priesthood of all Christians. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE SUFFICIEXCY OF HOLY SCRIPTUKE AS A RULE OF FAITH 
AXD PRACTICE. 

The Roman Catholic system has, perhaps, more clearly] 
and abundantly claimed infallibility for the Church than for 
Scripture, but all who regard Christianity as a religion of 
Divine authority, admit that the Bible stands in an unique 
relation to man. 



PKOTESTANT VIEW. 313 

At the Reformation, therefore, one of the great points of 
discussion between the Catholics and Protestants, was the 
position which ought to be assigned to the sacred Scrip- 
tures. Luther, converted through their perusal, found them 
the source of his strength, and in his battles with Rome 
he and all his followers maintained their full sufficiency. 
'' The foundation of articles of faith" said he, " is the word 
of God." The sixth article of the Church of England fairly 
embodies the general Protestant view in opposition to that 
of the Papists. "Holy Scripture containeth all things 
necessary to salvation, so that whatsoever is not read therein 
nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any 
man that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or 
be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." So im- 
portant is this esteemed, that in every ordination of a Pres- 
byter, and consecration of a bishop in that Church, the 
candidate is especially interrogated on this point, and has 
to promise conformity to this article in all his teachings. 
Just in proportion as Protestants have been brought into 
conflict with the Romish Church, this has been the ground 
on which alone they have planted themselves with success. 
It is the independent and original study of the sacred Rec- 
ords fostered by this great principle among the masses of 
the people, that has produced the superiority of Protestant 
nations in every point of view. All that the United States 
is at this moment, all the superiority of her people in mor- 
als and in enterprise over the Roman Catholic States of 
this continent, she owes to the reliance of her peoi3le on 
the Bible as the standard of their faith. This is the source 
and safeguard even of her liberties. It is tliis makes Mas- 
sachusetts what she is; and the want of it that makes 
Mexico what she is. All the brightest glory of England 

14 



314 M. i)E TOCQUEYILLE. 

can be traced to tliis one source, the Bible taken as the rule 
of Faith and hfe. It has been the foundation of national 
virtue and greatness v/herever it has gone, and a source of 
|)o\ver such as nothmg else hi the whole history of man- 
kind has produced,^ 

If now we look back a hundred years, we shall perceive 
that great progress has been made in the practical acknowl- 
edgment of this sufficiency and power of Scripture. Look 
for a moment particularly at the religious instruction of 
youth. One hundred years ago, and the chief means for ac- 
comphshing this were Catechisms and creeds committed to 
memory, in place of those fresh limng views of truth drawn 
from the Word of God, in the Sabbath School and Bible 
class systems which now prevail. A very important branch 
of literature has sprung up, designed to render the study 
of the Bible popular and pleasant to cliildren, and its his- 
tories and truths familiar. 

When M. de Tocqueville visited the mstitutions of the 
country, a few years ago, he went, among other places, of a 
Sabbath morning, to one of the largest Sabbath Schools in 
the city of i>rew York. Brought u]) in Roman Catholic or 
infidel France, he had never beheld such a sight before. 
Some hundreds of happy children all had Bibles in their 
hands. He had only seen them taught religion by Cate- 
chisms and forms of prayer. " What," he exclaimed, " do 
you let each of these young people read the Bible ?" 
" Yes." " And do you found your whole system of instruc- 

1 Let any one y>^1io doubts tlie above, read the history of Pitcairn'S 
Island, and see the effect of the Bible as a foundation of all the laws 
of old Adams, and of that authority which secured their obedience. He 
^yili never again question the amazing power of the Scriptures in a po- 
litical point of view. 



I 



POPISH objectio:n^s. 315 

tion directly on tlie Bible ?" " Yes." " And is tins done 
in yonr Sabbath Schools generally throughout the country ?" 
"Yes." "And do all the children attend?" "Very gen- 
erally." " It must 23roduce a profound impression upon the 
national character," was the reply of that sagacious philoso- 
pher. 

But the Koman Catholics have naturally turned upon all 
Protestants, and appealed to infant baptism as an unfailing 
proof of the authority of tradition and of the Church, and 
of the insufficiency of Scripture. They have said again and 
again, "we have substituted sprmlding for immersion by the 
authority of the Church, What other authority can you 
show for this ? Scripture is against you, and the very 
meaning of the word is against you. You baptize infants,, 
where is your authority ? This can not be proved from the 
Bible without the aid of tradition. We believe in it on the 
authority of the Church, but if you rely so much on the 
Bible alone you must give it up as unauthorized." IN'or 
have Protestants generally been fairly able to meet this. 
And hence among them all there has been* more or less of 
shrinking practically from the full sufficiency of Scripture, 
and a disposition to rely in part upon tradition. 

In no denomination has this tendency manifested itself so 
strongly as in the Episcopal Church, both in England and in 
this country ; and that chieliy in the form of Puseyism. In 
England it began among the clergy, Tliey were anxious 
to make head against the growing popularity and evangeli- 
cal power of the dissenters, by pretending to a degree of au- 
tliority in matters of faith which the non-conformist minis- 
ters utterly disclaimed as grossly superstitious and idola- 
trous. To such a degree of ai^proacli to Ilomanisni did tliis 
at length proceed, that in the celebrated Tract, No. 90, it is 



316 TRADITIO]^ TRACTS FOR THE TIMES. 

boldly stated that " In the sense in which it is commonly 
understood at this day, Scripture, it is plain, is not^ on An- 
glican principles, the rule of faith." " All difficulties in the 
interpretation of Scripture would be removed, or nearly 
so, would we but yield our private interpretations to the 
sense of the Church Cathohc whenever that can be ascer- 
tamed." ^ 

But such doctrines could only be made to appear plausi- 
ble by appealmg to the common belief in infant baptism in 
proof of the doctrme of tradition. This is done over and 
over again. The language of Field is quoted and referred 
to in these Tracts to prove tradition by infant baptism, thus, 
" The fourth kind of tradition is the continued ]3ractice of 
such thmgs as are neither contained in the Scripinres ex- 
vressly^ nor the excfinples of such practice expressly there 
delivered^ though the grounds, reasons, and causes of the 
necessity of such practice be there contained ; and the 
benefit or good that followeth of it. Of this sort is the bap- 
tism of infants^ which is therefore named a tradition, be- 
cause it is not' expressly deHvered in Scripture that the 
Apostles did baptize infants, nor an express jDi'^cept there 
found that they should do so."^ Bishop White and Mon- 
tague are also cited as more unqualifiedly still speaking of in- 
fant baptism, as practiced upon tradition alone, and "of 
which it may be declared that Scripture teacheth nothing?"^ ^ 
Directly the Puseyite is put to the proof, he retires back 
to infant baptism. It is perhaps in Scripture, he thinks, 
but certamly not on it. It can be wrought out by the 
aid of tradition, but it can not be proved fi'om the Bible 
alone. ' 

^ Carry's Testimony of the Fathers to the thirty-nine Articles, Pref. p. 2. 
2 Tract No. IT, p. 429. ^ Pages 431, 433, American edition. 



APPEALS TO "the FATHEES." 317 

The Presbyterian and Congregationalist may have pro- 
fessed to such men formerly that they could prove infant 
baptism from the Bible. But the "IS^orth British Review" 
now has openly given all this up, and directly Pedobaptists 
turn round to meet the Baptists, their main reliance is, and 
ever has been, certain scraps of the fathers and of Church 
history, half quoted and worse understood. Even these 
are now being abandoned ; and Church authority and dis- 
cretionary power are boldly appealed to as sufficient by 
Coleridge, I^eander, Bunsen, etc. In a word infant baptism 
essentially rests upon, and proves to those who believe in it, 
the insufficiency of Holy Scripture as a rule of faith and 
practice, and the great authority if not the supremacy of 
tradition or the Church. 

Let any one take up a defense of infant baptism, no mat- 
ter by what denomination prepared, or on what ground it 
is based, and he Avill be astonished at the vast parade of 
" the Fathers." Except our Episcopalian brethren, none use 
much of this kind of argument on other occasions ; hence 
the mistakes which many make when they try to employ 
it as to this rite. But the chief misfortune of it all lies in 
teaching the poor man that the Scriptures are not sufficient 
as a rule of faith. The practical result is that the real ap- 
peal in regard to this controversy is made to a very large, 
rare, and expensive class of wiitings, which few are familiar 
with, and which few could even read if they had them. 
Every time infant baptism is called in question, the mass of 
Pedobaptists have to go to their ministers for arguments. 
The Bible, they are forced to confess, seems to favor our views, 
but their minister tells them that something else is the true 
sense. And he in turn either has to become a Baptist, or else 
is obliged to set up in his own heart, Avithout perhaps doing 



318 EIGHTFUL CHUECH AUTHOEITY. 

SO in set words, the authority of tlie Church as superior 
to that of the Bible, since he beheves imphcitly the ap- 
parent teaching of the one at the expense of beHeving the 
apparent teaching of the other. In this way a supreme re- 
liance upon human authority, in matters of religion, becomes 
imperceptibly an established custom and habit. Infant 
baptism thus is made the entering-wedge of a principle 
which forms and molds the whole religious character, laymg 
the most substantial basis for Romanism. 

Far be it from us to wish to overthrow respect for the 
proper Scripture authority of each true Christian Church. 
But all submission of mind which leads men to receive on 
authority that which can not be ultimately substantiated by 
the reasons professed, nmst at some time give a severe shock 
to true faith. It will jDroduce a skepticism in regard to all 
those subjects vdiich are most easily received at first 
through confidence, in the judgment of others ; and pre- 
vent the knowledge of the wise becoming useful to the 
masses, except just so far as they are able at once to follow 
out the i^rocesses of reasoning mvolved, with full confidence 
in their own judgments. 

The Baptists have been distinguished for their close at- . 
tachment to the Scriptures. They, and they alone, have 
never appealed to any thing else for proof of any portion 
of their fiiith and j^ractice, as Christians. This has not been 
from any doubt as to the value and corroboration afforded 
by an impartial examination of Church history. One hun- 
dred and fifty years and more before I^^eander and the 
German scholars generally had arrived at the conclusions 
now becoming so universal as to infant baptism and the 
original pohty of the Church, Baptists had arrived at these 



THE MISSIO]S"AKY MOYEMENT. 319 

same conclusions, published them to the Avoiid, and fully 
verified them by early Church history. 

But it has been the prinGiple involved which has made 
them rely on the Scriptures alone^ as a sufficient appeal in 
all cases of controversy. The Bible and a Christian expe- 
rience in the heart are the only weapons needed. All the 
rest has ever been regarded by them as Saul's armor. 
They have preferred the simpler sling and stone of David. 

The simplicity of this principle has been favorable to 
their success. It is one capable of being wielded by a 
plowboy or tinker Tvith immense effect, as the writings of 
the dreamer of Bedford Jail have shoAvn. Its simplicity 
also has given those who adhere to it, courage, boldness, 
and strength to undertake the most difficult duties. 

It is worthy of remark how this simple principle has 
practically given strength, within the last hundred years, 
to a comparatively small denomination, poor and for the 
most part uneducated, and caused them thus to produce 
the leaders in many of those enterprises which have most 
tended to spread the Word of God among the nations ; 
enterprises which have even given to the age its chief re- 
ligious characteristics. 

The Missionary system now requires no very extraor- 
dinary amount of reliance in the Word of God, because 
faith is largely turned to sight. But it was a very different 
matter when the father of the modern English missionary 
movements, William Carey, sailed from the shores of Eng- 
land in 1793. This "consecrated cobbler," as Sydney 
Smith, with desecrated wit, facetiously termed liim, was 
for years the laughing-stock of the Reviewers, and of the 
Churchmen, ])oth high aiul low. For a long time he pUed 
his awl for a living, with a Hebrew Bible and a map of the 



320 CARET JCDSOX. 

world alternately spread out before him. That Bible he 
had taken for his rule of faith, and there he had read : 
" Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for an in- 
heritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for a pos- 
session." He turned to his map of the world, blackened 
over all the jDarts yet Ijmg in heathen darkness, and then 
his faith in the word of God, and that alone, assured him 
of a fact to which all around hhn were asleep, i, e., that there 
must be a brighter day reserved for the Church, and that 
it was the duty of Christians to ask the Father in the name 
of the Son, and then to rise and take possession of those 
vast regions, in the authority of Christ their Kmg. It was 
a case of the most simple unmixed faith in the j^romises 
and commands of Scripture alone ; and against all human 
encouragement and prospect of success, it led him forth 
without fortune and without outfit for his voyage, or per- 
mission to land, or means of suj^port. But he went down 
into the well, amid its darkness, damps, and vajDors, guided 
by the bright safety-lamp of God's Word, and by it alone. 
The heads of his great missionary sermon showed the 
sohtary principle which unpelled him : '' Expect great 
things from God ; and, attempt great thmgs for God." 

It was this implicit reliance on the Bible alone in William 
Carey, that awoke Protestant nations to that modern 
missionary movement which is now beginning to reap the 
harvest of the world. 

A swelling wave of this strong impulse soon spread 
across the broad Atlantic, and swept Judson and his com- 
panions to this great work, then all Congregationahsts in 
sentiment, yet animated by the same si^irit. But the 
feeling of allegiance to the Xew Testament caused Judson 
to become a Baptist also. In fact, fxith in the sufficiency of 



CHI^-ESE i:n"structiox. 321 

Scripture made liini all lie was, all he ever became. And 
thus began chiefly those great missionary enterprises of 
England and America which are now truly the most 
successful and astonishing- in the world. They have raised 
the Sandwich Islands to the rank of a civilized people, and 
are fast scattering the seeds of life, liberty, and love among 
the heathen nations of the earth. In fact, the Word of 
God is at tliis moment exhibiting a power, through its mis- 
sionary operations, as extraordinary in its political effects 
upon the world at large, as in the early centuries upon the 
Roman empire. 

A few years ago an uncouth missionary w^as preaching in 
Canton, when a Chinese student applied to be taught the 
outlines of the Christian system, and finally for baptism. 
This latter w^as refused from a just fear that the Gospel had 
not a sufficient hold upon the young man's heart, but that 
young man took the same method of imparting Christian 
truth that he had seen practiced by the missionaries with 
whom he had resided, and through these Biblical instructions, 
imperfectly conveyed, spread around him a knowledge of 
Christian truth. At length the authorities, officers of the 
Tartar dynasty, interfered arbitrarily and cruelly, and the 
community of the ancient Chinese rose really in defense of 
religions Uherty, Thus commenced the present insurrec- 
tion, and that student was the acknowledged head of the 
existing movement. Whatever may be the political results, 
whatever the religious superstitions involved, whatever the 
motives in the hearts of the leaders, God only knows ; but 
it is in the midst of such confused scenes that God is carry- 
ing the knowledge of the Bible and of Christ, to the hearts 
of the millions of Chinese by the lips of tlieir own country- 
men, as they never could have been conveyed in centuries 

14* 



322 POWEll OF THE BIBLE 

by foreign missionaries. Nor do the superstitions appear 
to be more numerous or important than might be naturally 
expected, or than early Church history shows to have at- 
tended the first rapid spread of the Gospel among the hea- 
then nations, and even the Jews. 

Three principles which characterize this movement, 
give it great hopefulness. It guarantees full religious lib- 
erty, it promotes the circulation of the Scriptures in large 
quantities, and it makes war upon the use of opium and all 
intoxicating liquors. 

Just before the rise of the movement, so discouraging 
had matters appeared to the eyes of Christians in this 
country, that they had begun to despair of any large re- 
sults in China. We were told that there were not so many 
converts as missionaries, after more than twenty years of 
labor ; that they were a cold, hard, polished people, not 
with hearts like other men, but without any real religious 
character to work upon. Missionary boards were utterly 
discouraged until this news suddenly burst upon them. 
No man can yet foresee the results of this movement en- 
tirely ; but some things have been demonstrated, namely, 
that the Chinese are not the cold, hard, atheistic people 
they used to be imagined. Now it seems that suiDcrstition 
is the chief fault. It may be that Christianity is to operate 
here primarily as the rod of iron dashing in pieces the pot- 
ter's vessel. How often does it really seem to act on 
governments like the flibled island of loadstone, which first 
drew the vessels to it througli their iron bolts, and then 
drew out all the bolts that held them together. So Chris- 
tianity by absorbing and drawing to itself through its own 
holiness and attractiveness all the elements of good, is the 
occasion unquestionably of many a rotten system of govern- 



COMTAKED WITH "tIIE CHURCH." 323 

ment and of iniquity, dissolving and dropping to pieces of 
its own weight, as the walls of Jericho fell flat before the 
rani's horns of Joshua and of the priests. The destructive 
energy of Christianity thus acting with the force of miracle, 
prepares the way for faith in its power as a reconstructive 
system. One thing is indeed certain, the New Testament 
as the rule of faith, has given to the modern missions of 
Protestantism, their energy and success, and all their supe- 
riority over those conducted by the Papists. 

Wherever Roman Catholic missionaries have gone, they 
have first taken pains to establish the authority of tlie Churchy 
just where we put that of the Bible. This has been the 
characteristic difference, and this has led to the diiferent 
results. A few years ago. Dr. Wiseman treated with scorn 
the attemjots of Protestant missionaries as perfect failures 
compared with those of Rome, seeing that we could only 
count up a very few thousands as the result of our last fifty 
years' labor and expenditures, while the Catholics could 
boast of millions. It was in vain we pointed out that for 
real power and knowledge and piety our thousands were 
worth more than 'their millions, that our humblest converts 
were in character better than their saints. They looked 
and cared alone for numbers, and all Avhom they could get, 
whether adults or children, if submitted to their sprinkling, 
they accounted converts. On the contrary, modern Protest- 
ant missions have been founded on the Word of God as the 
rule of faith and practice. Hence they have bestowed far 
more labor on the work of translating the Scriptures, and 
this has seemed for years to retard their labors. Francis 
Xavicr's zeal was splendid and brilliant initsAvay, like some 
e I sudden charge of cavalry, that seemed to carry all before it. 
He baptized thousands where our missionaries would hardly 



324 CAREY AXD XAVIEIi C OI^TTF. ASTED . 

liave baptized one. He swept every thing before iiis face, 
but the enemy closed in overwhehning masses on his rear, 
as where cavahy are not supported by intantry, and the re- 
sults of his labors were comparatively fruitless of permanent 
spiritual results. 

William Carey hardly baptized a hundred at Serampore, 
where Xavier would have sprinkled a million, and such has 
been the contrast every where. But then as to the amount 
of good actually done on a broad scale, the results are to 
be estimated differently. The Jesuit missionaries, as a 
whole, have passed thi'ough many lands like the whirlwind 
through the desert. They seem to achieve svreeping suc- 
cess, but leave ruin and desolation in their track. They 
change the name of the heathen gods, but leave the poo])le 
idolaters ; baptize the images, and call them saints. But 
take away the Papal priests for a few years, and their con- 
verts relapse without any sensible change. They multiply 
churches as rapidly as travelers i^itcli their tents, because 
they have no foundation to dig. On the other hand. Bap- 
tists have dug deep, because building for eternity, and the 
foundation once laid on the Kock of Ages,' and the under- 
ground work done, the superstructure is easily erected and 
lasts, because solid. If any one in this point of view com- 
pares Protestant missions generally, with Catholic, they will 
be astonished at the difference. The conversion of the na- 
tives has been delayed for the work of translation, bafHed 
by disease, weakened by deaths, and yet more real progress 
has been made by Protestants for the overthrow of hea- 
thenism in Asia, in fifty years, than Roman Catholics have 
made in ages. And with us the work is only just beginning, 
v,diile theirs is being brought to a close. Protestant mis- 
sions in twenty years, have produced more sensible results 



BIBLICAL TKAKSLATIONS. 325 

in the tliree liiinclred millions of China, than the Koman 
Cathohc eiiorts in ten centuries. 

The press occupies a very different position among Prot- 
estants from what it does among Papists, because when 
men have learned to read the Bible they have acquired the 
key of all knowledge and the desire to enter its opened door. 
The work of translation is infinitely more prominent in the 
one than in the other. This has caused our success. And 
if it be asked what has made this great difference in the 
two methods of operation, we must look for it in the type 
of labor first entered upon by the pioneers in this enter- 
prise. We must look for the germ of it very greatly in 
the mission presses of Serampore. 

William Carey and his associates had been accustomed 
to prove every thing by Scripture, Of strong sense but 
ignorant of philosophy, and of Church history, the Bible 
and experimental religion were their great resorts. Wil- 
liam Carey could as soon have made shoes without a 
last, as a discourse without his Bible. Hence before the 
Baptists could fairly get to work they must translate 
tlie Bible. The herculean labors of this kind already 
performed by Protestant missions, \vithin the last lifty 
years, probably exceed all that was done in eighteen hun- 
dred years before. Languages have been reduced to writ- 
ing, grammars made, lexicons formed, the Bible translated, 
and nations been taught to read its pages of everlasting 
life. 

Comparatively few, poor and ignorant as the Baptists 
were, when Carey started on liis great mission, it could 
little have been expected that tliey shoukl liave been able 
at all to keep pace with other Protestants in tjie blessed 
rivalry of translating and givhig the Word of God to the 



326 BIBLE SOCIETIES. 

heathen. And yet on examination it will be found that 
they have done far more than then- natural proportion in 
this great work, even among Protestant missionaries who 
have all w^rought nobly. Carey translated the Bible into 
one language, and Judson into another, and thus the work 
was begun by English and thus by American Christian 
missionaries. 

If now from the work of translating the Scriptures we 
turn to that of distributing them, nobly have the Bible So- 
cieties of Europe and America all wrought. They have 
reduced the price of the Bible so that what the whole labor 
of a workmg man for a life time would hardly have pro- 
cured him before printing was invented, may now be pur- 
chased for a quiarter of a dollar, or the worth of his labor 
for an hour or two. Forty millions of Bibles and Testa- 
ments have been ]3ut into circulation since Bible Societies 
arose ; while but four million had been published in the eight- 
een hundred years before. Protestants have spread the bless- 
ed book, not only over the civilized world, but among heathen 
nations, of one hundred and fifty different tongues, and 
dialects, with a profusion and success that must make the 
work of ministers at home and missionaries abroad quite 
different, and it is to be hoped far more successful, in future 
than heretofore. 

But here again the mind that first conceived of the form- 
ation of a Bible Society was Rev. William Hughes, a 
Baptist. He formed the idea, drew up the circular that 
called it into existence, wrought out the plan, and for years 
watched over its success. Indeed it has been declared by 
an impartial and cotemporary authority, that "the Bible 
Society w^as almost entirely the result of his suggestions." ^ ^ 
■ "London Christian Guardian," in his obituary notice. 



^1 



THE CHARGE OF BIBLIOLATRY. 327 

Let no injustice be done to other denominations. They 
have had the honor of doing more, far more than Baptists 
have in spreading the Bible among all nat-lons. They have 
had wealth, and numbers, and influence that we have not 
possessed. And many of them have manifested a zeal and 
Uberality which could not have been excelled. But yet it 
may be questioned if it has been altogether by accident, or 
not in part by the force of inherent principles and owing 
to Baptists being, in fact, men of one Book, that they have 
furnished the pioneers to the extent which has been shown 
to those modern movements which form the hope of the 
aQ:e — Foreig-n Missions — Biblical translations and the circu- 
lation of the Bible without restriction and without com- 
ment. 

These are the great religious enterprises of the times, giv- 
ing to the present age its deepest interest and to the future 
its brightest hojDes. All certainly are developments of that 
great principle, the poioer and sitficiency of Scripture. 

Nor is this principle worn out, waxing old, and ready to 
vanish away as many suppose who are inveighing against 
the " Bibliolatry" of the present age. It has done much, 
but it has got to do still more. The religion of Jesus 
Christ as a system of doctrines and practice, is threatened 
now as never before, by Roman Catholicism on the one 
hand, and German Rationalism on the other. Both of 
these profess a sort of Christianity and offer it the tribute 
of a professed veneration. So that now the great question 
is, how are we to determine and to prove what is true 
Christian faith ? Where are we to draw the line between 
it and superstition, as between it and infidelity. A line 
must be drawn somewhere ; and in all simplicity w^e plead 
that it should be dra^vn just here. That system of religion 



328 THE COXSTITUTIOXAL TZXT-EOOK. 

wliicli Chiist and His Apostles taiiglit^and which is, there- 
fore, recorded in the Xew Testament, that and. nothing 
dse isjy^^i'e Christiamty. 

And Chiistlanity not only as a system of doctrines, but 
also of eccUsiastical relations^ mnst be defined in the same 
manner. TTithin the last few years much has been said 
and written about "the Church." The German boasts of 
this as an age of historico-philosophical reconstruction 
which is to erect what he call^ the Chiistian Chiu'ch em- 
bodying all the developments and cutting off ah the abuses 
of the past eighteen himdred years. He claims a right to 
alter in the name of sentiment, beauty, and expediency. 
Even Bunsen wishes, as we see, to •' reform the doctrines 
of the Bible.'' Tlie Roman Cathohc professes an inherent 
right in the Church by wtue of a supposed indwelhng Di- 
vine authority resting in the successors of St. Peter, to do 
the same. The Anglican party hi the Ejjiscopal Church, 
makes the same claim in behalf of the Three Orders of that 
denomination. But all of these have overlooked the 
broader, deeper question which concerns not Church gov- 
ernment but Church existence, Xot who are the proper 
qj^icers^ but who are the proper members. The Church is 
the assembly not the rulers, the people not the Priests. 
The government of a coimtry or of a society is one thing, 
the citizenshii) quite another. France changed her gov- 
ernment thiiteen times in filty years, but the French nation 
never ceased to exist. There is something infinitely more 
vital to a Chmx-h than how many orders shall compose its 
officers, i. e.^ ichat constitutes the terms of membership? 
This question can not be determined, hardly discussed im- 
til the Xew Testament is respected as the only constitu- 
tional Text-JBoolc of the Christian Church, instead of being 



■ 



justificatiojS- by gkace. 329 

ignored as it is practically by all these systems, modern and 
antiquated, that of Chevalier Bunsen no less than that of 
Cardinal Wiseman, and all in between. 



CHAPTEE II. 

SAI.YATI0K BY GBACE ALONE. 

In all ages men have built their hopes of salvation either 
upon their own good works, or upon the grace of God ; 
or upon some admixture of the two. The doctrine of St. 
Paul unquestionably is, that we are justified by faith alone, 
and not by the deeds of the law. That our salvation is 
" not of woiks, lest any man should boast ;" but that it is 
by grace alone we are saved. Justification being a gratui- 
tous thing, and good works the necessary results of a living 
faith ; the effects, therefore, and not in any degree the 
meritorious cause of our salvation. 

This was the principle which Luther uttered, and insisted 
upon with so much energy, as the mark of a standing or of 
a falling Church ; it was the leading principle of the Re- 
formation. 

Centuries before, indeed, Augustine had boldly preached 
it, from his own experience ; but it had become completely 
overshadowed by the ceremonies of the Church and the 
doctrines of human merit. All the Reformed Churclies, in 
proportion to the life of their piety, placed this as the cor- 
ner-stone of true Christianity. 

The Churcli of England declares, in her eleventh Article, 



330 ECLIPSE OF THE DOCTRIXE. 

"that we are justified by foitli onlij^ is a most wholesorae 
doctrine ;" and in the twelfth Article, that " good works, 
as the//v^/^6^ of ^-Aiih^ follow <7/?(?;' jiistilication," "as a tree 
is discerned hy its fruits,'' but "can not jnit away our 
sins ;" while, in the thirteenth Article, it further urges that 
" works done before the grace of Christ and the inspiration 
of his Spirit are not pleasant to God ; forasmuch as they 
spring not of faith in Jesus Christ, neither do they make 
men meet to receive grace." And yet again in the four- 
teenth Article, that " works of supererogation can not be 
taught without arrogancy and impiety." 

This Avas the doctrine prevalent in England, Scotland, 
and throughout the Continent, among the Reformed 
Churches, down to the period of tlie English Common- 
wealth. Doubtless many a courtly priest of Elizabeth and 
Charles I. believed in High Church doctrines of an oppos- 
ing character, but these liad to be taught in such covered 
up and ambiguous language that those who held them 
were tolerated only because tlieir sentiments were not dis- 
cerned through the drapery of language in which they 
were enveloped. 

From the restoration of Charles II., however, this great 
doctrine, though not openly denied, was gradually thrown 
into the shade. In England this neglect might have been 
from its supposed connection with Puritanism. But in 
Scotland it was the same, and so on the Continent of Eu- 
rope. Even the Congregational churches of Xew England 
felt its inlluence. A more general cause, therefore, must be 
looked for, and this is to be found alone in the uneoncerted 
tnemhershij) introduced into all these churches by infant 
baptism. 

About one hundred years ago, nothing can be conceived 



ITS REYIYAL. 331 

of, more dead than the religious condition of the Church 
of England. Cowper, the poet of the evangelical faith, 
was yet a law-student, and Montgomery was not yet born. 
Romaine and a few others preached the doctrine, we are 
considering, in the Established Church, and were grossly 
lampooned by Hogarth for doing so. Wesley and White- 
field suffered every obloquy and insult for declaring it. In 
IsTew England, Edwards was dismissed from his pastoral 
charge for upholding it, and the Tennents, who maintained 
it, gathered round them a small and despised minority in 
the Presbyterian Church. The general revivals of religion 
which took place, however, under the preaching of such 
men as we have named, soon produced a very different 
state of things, especially in this country. Large numbers 
seceded and joined the Baptists, and this among other 
causes perhaps rendered the clergy of other denominations 
more open in their adoption of these sentiments. In Eng- 
land, the bulk of the Dissenters Avere men who held these 
truths ; and they were encouraged by the rise of the 
Methodists, no less than by the boldness and extemporane- 
ous eloquence of the evangelical party in the Church of 
England. Thus the doctrine m question became exceed- 
ingly popular with the masses of all denominations, until 
the check given to it, in certain quarters, by the advance 
of Puseyism within about twenty years. 

In Scotland, Chalmers and men of his stamp became 
every where popular. In Geneva the flame of evangelical 
religion was lighted up through the labors of a Haldane ; 
and in the United States, during the past fifty years, the 
membership of the evangelical Churches adhering to this 
faith, has multiplied from about four hundred thousand 
to three millions and a half, bemg an increase of 



332 EPISCOPAL FORMULARIES. 

eightfold, ^vhile our population has expanded only four- 
fold. 

The point to be considered just now is, whether infant 
baptism is or is not friendly and consistent with the spread 
of this great doctrine, to which all evangelical Protestants 
have professedly subscribed. A moment's consideration 
will show that it stands in utter contradiction to justifica- 
tion by faith alone. 

Infant baptism has generally been held to involve a savmg 
change from a state of darkness into one of grace, thus put- 
tmg an act of man m place of the free gift of God. In the 
Church of Rome this is, and has been ever, the doctrine 
avowed, and in the Church of England, smce the Reforma- 
tion, her formularies have retained the same language, 
though in contradiction to the spirit of her articles. Even 
tha final decision in the celebrated case of Rev. Mr. Gor- 
ham, vs. the Bishop of Exeter, within a year or two, ad- 
mits that such is the teaching of the Church of England 
formularies, only maintainmg that it was not so essential 
a part of the system as to justify the silencing of a minister 
of Low-Church views. We know that the evangelical min- 
isters of that denomination have been better than their 
forms, but what else can common people understand beside 
baptismal regeneration from such hmguage as that in which 
God is solemnly besought " for this infant that he, coming 
to thy holy baptism^ may receive remission of sin by spiritual 
regeneration. Receive him, O Lord as Thou hast prom- 
ised." Just before the baptism, it is prayed, " sanctify this 
water to the mystical washing away of sin." And imme- 
diately after baptism it is officially declared, " seeing how, 
dearly beloved, that this child is regenerate^'' etc., while the 
Divine Being is solemnly addi'cssed in language such as this, 



II 



BAPTISMAL GRACE. 333 

"We yield Thee hearty thanks, most merciful Father, 
that it hath pleased Thee to regenerate this infant with 
Thine Holy Spirit; to receive him for Thine own child, 
by adoption, and to incorporate him into Thy holy 
Church." 

A spiritual change and a change of state are here declared 
to have taken place, and sacramental works are put as the 
channel through which the grace is asserted to have flowed, 
in circumstances, too, where the party supposed to be justi- 
fied can not even have manifested faith. What can more 
directly cut at the root of justification by faith alone with- 
out works ? So clear, uniform, and certainly afifecting the 
eternal condition is this change supposed to be, by the 
Church of England, that in case a child die at any time 
after the performance of this cerellK)ny it may be buried in 
consecrated ground. But if not thus sprinkled it has no 
such right, and in 1854 a bishop refused to consecrate one 
portion of a public burial-ground for the members of the 
Church of England unless a substantial loall should separate 
their dead from those of the Dissenters. 

It may be said that all who have practiced infant baptism 
have not believed it to produce a saving change like this. 
True, but essentially infant baptism teaches that it in some 
way alters the spiritual condition of the child, that it makes 
the child dying in infancy "more safe." Whatever good 
it effects is not of grace, but of works ; works going before 
justification, and not the fruits of faith. To get rid of this, 
some of the New England divines have taken the ground 
that the children of parents who are in the Church are em- 
braced in the covenant hy birth and therefore baptized, thus 
not admitting that baptism brings them into it. But in that 
case the baptism of their parents would be as sufficient as 



334 IXEANT BAPTISM 

their faith. Unquestionably the IN'ew England divines have 
had all sorts of theories, earnestly desuing to make intant 
baptism less contradictory to the Avhole evangelical system 
than it naturally appears. This Dr. Bushnell has shown 
while himself endeavormg to establish yet another view. 
Cert am it is that in Xew England, in spite of all its mgen- 
ious theories, infant baptism, through the half covenant sys- 
tem, had well-nigh subverted the whole evangelical faith, 
especially around BostoUe 

Dr. Ide^ says, "A Pedobaptist historian very candidly 
mforms us that, at the beginning of the present century all 
the Cong:re2:ational Churches in Boston, with a sino-le ex- 

O O 7 

ception, had renounced the faith of the Puritans. Tlie Old 
South stiU stood upon the platform of the Fathers, though 
her i^astor was a semi-Apan. But when the enemy came in 
hke a flood, the S23irit of the Lord lifted up a standard 
against him. In the year 1803 the Baptist Churches m the 
city were visited with a jDrecious revival, in which the Old 
South shared to some extent. A few of the members of 
this Church occasionally worshipmg with the Baptists be- 
came revived and established a prayer-meeting among 
themselves, from which a renovating movement commenced 
that has been the origin of aU the orthodox Congregational 
Churches with which the city of the Pilgrims is now blessed. 
Thus when infant baptism had put out the fire on all its 
own altars, with the excejDtion of one solitary shrine, and 
had caused it even there to burn dim and low, the flame 
was kindled agam from altars w^hich this unscriptural rite 
had never been suflered to profane. And while amid the 
Egyptian darkness that settled over the Pedobaptists in 

^ See his edition of Infant Baptism Part and Pillar of Popery, pp. 
95-98. 



AXD UNITAKIANISM. 335 

Boston, the Baptists in their Goshen, at the ISTorth End, 
thus walked in unclouded light, and showed themselves 
valiant for the truth ; so throughout the land, feeble and 
scattered as they were, they stood firm by the cause of 
their Master. Though thousands around were casting off 
the authority of Jesus, not a man of them wavered in his 
allegiance. From all their places of worship the ensign of 
the cross streamed out undepressed and untarnished, and 
from all their pulpits the Godhead of Christ and the sover- 
eign efficacy of His blood were distinctly and earnestly pro- 
claimed. 

" To the memory of these brave hearted men justice may 
never be done in this world, but we doubt not, hi the great 
day of decision, when all events and mstrumentalities shall 
be placed in their true light, it will appear that to the Bap- 
tists of Massachusetts belongs the honor of having been 
the first to arrest the overflowing scourge, that they were 
the Abdiels who remained faithful in the midst of revolted 
multitudes, that it was they who, when all seemed lost, 
threw themselves single-handed into the van of the battle 
apd held the field against fearful odds, until behind their 
scattering front the broken ranks of orthodoxy were formed 
anew. Peace to the ashes of these Christian heroes." 



336 THE ESSENTIAL PRIESTHOOD. 

CHAPTER III. 

THE ESSENTIAL PEIESTHOOD OF ALL TRUE CHRISTIANS. 

Two of the most deservedly popular Trriters of Ecclesi- 
astical history in the present day, Xeander and Merle 
D'Aiibigne, consider " the essential priesthood of all true 
Christians'^'' as one of the most important and original fea- 
tm-es presented in the history of the Christian Church. In 
his " History of the Reformation" the latter of these says, 
" At the beginning the Church was a society of brethren. 
* * * All Christians were priests of the living God with 
humble j)astors for thek guidance. * * * ]g^^ \^ 
popery the holy and primitive equality of souls before God 
is lost sight of, Christians are divided into two strangely 
unequal camps, on the one side, a separate class of priests, 
on the other, timid flocks reduced to blind submission." 
Indeed he declares that one of the two most important fea- 
tures in which Christianity differed from all the human sys- 
tems which fell before it was, that " whereas the priests ©f 
Paganism were almost the gods of the ^^^ople, Jesus 
Christ dethroned those hvmg idols, abolished this proud 
hierarchy — took from man what man had taken from God, 
and re-established the soul in direct communication with 
the Divine fountain of truth, j^roclaiming himself the only 
Master and Mediator. One is your Master, even Christ, and 
ye are all brethren." 

IN'eander traces out the departure from this principle as 
one of the first great corruptions — ^^ re^^olutionizing^^'' in 
fact, the Christian Church.^ He sjDcaks of " the formation 

* Torrej, vol. i. 193-200. 



XEAXDER A1\J} BUNSEIST. 337 

of a sacerdotal caste in tlie Christian CliurcL" as '' an idea 
alien to the Christian principle — an idea which could not fail 
to bring about a revolution of views, destined to last for 
ages, and even to unfold itself in a wider circle from the 
germ which had once been implanted." " The great prin- 
ciple of the IsTew Testament, the universal priestly charac- 
ter, grounded in that common and hnmediate relation of 
all to Christ as the source of the divine life was repressed, 
the idea interposing itself of a particular mediatory priest- 
hood attached to a distinct order." 

After this '' Although the idea of the (universal) priest- 
hood, in the purely evangelical sense, grew continually 
more obscure and was thrust further into the background, 
in proportion as that unevangelical point of view became 
more and more predominant, yet it was too deeply rooted 
in the very essence of Christianity to be totally suppressed." 
" When the idea of this universal priesthood retired into 
the background, that of the priestly consecration which all 
Christians should make of their entire life vmit along 
with it,'^'' 

Chevalier Bunsen, in his recent work on " Hippolytus and 
his Times," insists with great strenuousness on the same 
truths and their vital importance. 

But a higher authority among Christians than Neander 
or than Bunsen addressed himself to the members gener- 
ally of the first Churches of Christ, and said, " Ye also, as 
lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priest- 
hood to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by 
Jesus Christ." ^ 

All true Christians, then, are by nature and hiheritance, 
priests^ and as such it is their highest privilege and imper- 

^ 1 Potor, ii. 5, 9. 
15 



338 DITTIES OF THE PEIESTHOOD. 

ative duty to pray for and teach all manldnd the knowledge 
of the true God. 

That which m this country forms the basis of all our lib- 
erties, is the acknow^ledged fact of the sovereignty residing 
in the people, and not in the rulers. So, that which consti- 
tutes the liberty and excellency of true Christianity as op- 
posed to false, is the essential priesthood of all true Chris- 
tians. In heaven the souls of the blessed continually do 
praise the Kedeemer, not only that He hath redeemed them 
to God by his blood, but hath made them kings £ind priests 
to ^' God and to the Lamb." 

We have not in this lost sight of the Christian ministry 
as a distinct and divinely constituted order. The political 
fact that the sovereignty is in the people, does not obviate 
the necessity of executive ofiicers, such as a president and 
magistrates. Neither, then, does the universal priesthood 
of the Church do aAvay with distinct ministries and pastor- 
ships. But there is much work in the Church which never 
can be adequately performed by ministers alone, or while 
all other Christians forget that they, too, have sacrifices to 
offer and duties to accomplish. 

This whole subject has not unfrequently been stated in 
missionary and other discourses, thus: "The evangeliza- 
tion of the world belongs to all churches and to all Chris- 
tians as such, but all are not able to go out personally to 
preach Christ, and these must do their part by contributing 
to the support of those who do go." But such a repre- 
sentation even as this falls utterly short of the great truth 
stated by St. Peter. It makes a loop-hole for laziness in the 
great commission itself. For many a man might easily 
afford to give his hundreds or his thousands, if he could 
thus buy himself off from the duty of personal labors and 



IMPEKFECTLY COI^CEIYED. 339 

services for the cause of Christ. While the Christian, how- 
ever, as a priest, has got to present the sacrifices and the 
thank offerings of his gold and his silver upon the altar of 
God, he has far more than this all to do. He has first of 
all to present himself a living sacrifice. His time, his tal- 
ents, his personal labors, and instructions, must all be fully 
consecrated to the service of his Master. 

The greatest difficulty is not to find men who are willing 
to contribute for the support of all church and missionary 
expenses cheerfully. There are thousands who will pay a 
minister liberally to pray for them and preach to them, 
and to the whole world besides, if they may but sit still in 
spiritual idleness or follow their wonted pursuits from Mon- 
day morning to Saturday night, unmolested by the claims 
of religion and by the duties of this universal priesthood. 
We would not disparage the moralities and amiabilities 
manifested by such persons ; and it is, perhaps, a hopeful 
sign to see their places filled in the sanctuary on the Sab- 
bath. But we can not help asking whether those who are 
in Scripture addressed as " a holy priesthood," have not 
got some spiritual sacrifices to offer up themselves, whether 
it is not their duty to instruct their children at home in the 
ways of piety, and to pray in their families, and in the 
prayer-meetings, and to take part in the Sabbath-school 
and Bible-classes. It is as truly their prerogative to labor 
directly for the conversion of souls to God as it is of those 
who preach. 

This has been the great point at issue between true and 
formal religion in all ages. Tliat professed Christian who 
does not labor personally, and pray earnestly, for the con- 
version of mankind, not only lowers down the tone of the 
whole of God's eternal priesthood by an injurious example, 



340 PEOTESTAiS^T POPERY. 

but injures his own soul inconceivably by the lack of these 
spiritual exercises. One can no more maintain the comforts 
of piety in his OT\^l soul without an active and aggressive 
piety than a man can enjoy health without exertion. And 
it is for this cause that so many are weak and sickly among 
us, and so many sleep. Exercise on the one hand, or disease 
on the other, are as much laws of the spiritual as of the 
physical world. Except a man deny himself, says the 
Saviour, and take up his cross daily, he can not be my dis- 
ciple — and if not a disciple, not a priest. 

Indeed, the Christian, all the time he is on earth, is, in 
this respect, like one recovermg from a long and dangerous 
disease, the exercise that refreshed him yesterday, and in- 
creased his health, will be too little for him to-morrow, and 
he must go on increasing his labors as he increases strength, 
under the penalty of a relapse. Yea, there is a joyousness 
about the increasing exertions of pious labor like that of 
one whose strength is daily augmenting, l^o man who is 
not laboring earnestly, and laboring directly^ as a sjDiritual 
priest Aviil enjoy the spiritual health and privileges, which 
are his birthright. 

We may call ourselves Protestants, or by any other name 
we please, but the restrictions of the priesthood to the 
ministry is the essential error of Popery. That system 
makes the minister the only jDriest — the only one to offer 
up the spiritual sacrifices of prayer and j^raise, keej)ing back 
the people from doing any thing. And just as the old ab- 
solutists of Europe have placed that sovereignty in one 
man, that rightly belongs to the whole people, so it 
has devolved that priesthood upon the minister alone, 
which properly belongs to the whole Church of Jesus 
Christ. The welfare of all Christian Churches depends upon 



CONGREGATIOJS^AL Sl^^GING. 341 

all the professors of religion, not devolving it upon saints, 
or priests, or ministers, to pray for them, but themselves 
praying and laboring all for the conversion of a world to 
Christ. Here lies the great strength of true Christian 
Churches : not in the labors of the ministry alone, but of 
all the people. This multiplies power a thousandfold. 

One hundred years ago, if we mistake not, the laity were 
singularly inactive in most Protestant denominations. In 
England, from the death of Oliver Cromwell to the rise of 
Wesley, the people in almost all denominations seem to have 
been paralyzed. In the State Church of that country this 
was especially the case. Hardly one active religious layman 
in any department of Christian enterprise appears in her 
history, and very few among the ^Nonconformists, while 
meetings for prayer and religious conference appear to have 
dwindled strangely. 

In New England, matters were in the same state. Lay 
preaching seemed confined, through the country, to the Bap- 
tists, and in England, to them, the Methodists, and perhaps 
a few Independents. 

The most general and nearest approach to the recognition 
of the principle we are illustrating has, in various ages, been 
the congregational singing of the praises of God in public 
worship. The importance of this is but little aj^preciated 
commonly, even in the present day. Through it originally 
the Jewish synagogue made its most powerful attacks upon 
Paganism. Proud Roman women of the highest rank, 
drawn by the majesty of those h^onns there sung to the great 
Jehovah, were drawn in crowds from heathen temples to 
poor little synagogues in the outskirts of Rome and other 
cities. Thus were the foundations of Paganism shaken 
among the nations, preparatory to the bringing in of a new 



342 AUGUSTINE ON SINGING. 

dispensation. But Christianity carried this part of Trorship 
to a far higher degree of perfection than Judaism had done, 
for \Yith Christians the universal priesthood led each to 
emulate the other in swelling the mighty praises of the 
Triune God, and joining with all their voices even where 
they had choirs to lead. Hence it is observable that in the 
letter of Phny to Trajan, describmg their worship at the 
begmning of the second century, he speaks of them as a 
body of people accustomed to meet on a particular day, and 
" smg praises to Christ as to God," whUe he says nothing 
of their preaching. 

Augustine speaks Tvith great piety and self-inspection in 
regard to the effects of this part of Divine worship on his 
own soul. 

'' When I remember the tears I shed at the Psalmody of 
Thy Church, in the beginning of my recovered faith, and 
how at this time I am moved not T\ith the singing, but 
with the things sung, when they are sung with a clear 
voice and modulation most suitable, I acknowledge the 
great use of this histitution. Thus I fluctuate between 
peril of pleasure and approved wholesomeness, mclined the 
rather (though not as pronouncing an irrevocable opinion) 
to approve of the ways of singing in the Church, that so 
by the delight of the ears the weaker minds may rise to 
the feeling of devotion." ^ 

In the present day, whatever means best promote the 
singing of the whole congregation should be used ; but let 
each Christian be assured that his heart swelling, and his 
voice jommg in the sweet harmonies and choruses of the 
house of God, is a more acceptable sacrifice to his Maker 
than the smoke of incense and of burnt-offering. It gives 
1 Confessions, lib. 10 : 49. 



MISSIOIS^AEY BOAKBS. 343 

forth the solemn testimony of the loJioU Christian x^eople 
to the truths that are uttered from the desk ; preaches them 
over again with such a voice and testimony to the micon- 
verted as will be found among the most pov/erful and elevated 
methods by which the Church fulfills its universal priesthood. 
No small portion of this priesthood of the people is per- 
formed through those Boards, Trusteeships, Societies, Com- 
mittees, and agencies of voluntary Societies to effect eccle- 
siastical objects, to which the pious benevolence of the 
present age has given rise. These were almost unknovm a 
century ago. ISTow the good which is being effected through 
their means is incalculable. And it is in proportion as these 
operations become well known to the body of the Christian 
people that they elicit the prayers, exertions,, and contribu- 
tions of the whole. Let the Christian layman, who is 
called to labor in the fulfillment of many a thankless Com- 
mittee service, remember that in so doing he is helping to 
fulfill the duties of the priesthood at home, as really, and 
perhaps quite as effectually, as the missionary abroad. Let 
him not begrudge the time which these duties involve, but 
cheerfully and prayerfully discharge them, as engagements 
to which he is called by the great Head of the Church. 
Christians at home hold the rope, while missionaries go 
down into the vv^ells and caverns below, to ex]3lore the 
darkness of a lost world. How many ministers suffer in 
their health most seriously, and have to neglect their own 
more immediate duties, because men of piety and intelli- 
gence, from the ranks of the business part of tlie commu- 
nity, are not to be found willing and reliable in the perform- 
ance of these labors. The knowledge of the Avorld pos- 
sessed by an intelligent and active lawyer or business man, 
would, in many cases, be fir more valuable than any other 



344 THE SABBATH SCHOOL SYSTEM. 

experience iii the miinagement of that heavenly treasure, 
the merchandise of which is better than the merchandise 
of SLLver or of gold. 

More dh-ectly still, the Sabbath-school, Bible-class, and 
Colportem- systems, which have grown to such importance 
witliin the last century, exliibit in many ways the power 
and utilities of the universal priesthood of the whole 
Christian Church. For they all rest broadly and immedi- 
ately upon the people, being almost entirely plans of lay 
instruction, or rather systems which make each Christian a 
priest, to ofler up spiritual sacrifices. These are develop- 
ments the most interestmg, the most powerful, and the 
most economical, of any of the great movements of our 
age, producing greater efforts for good upon the national 
mmd, and upon the great heart of the rismg generation 
throughout the world. 

In the Sabbath-school we find a system that is self-sus- 
taining. It requires little or no money. Wherever there 
is a Church, and often where there is none, some individu- 
als possess more piety, knowledge, and aptitude to teach 
than others. Some are old and have experience, others are 
young and need mstruction. The Sabbath-school rests 
upon and illustrates this great princijDle, that it is the duty 
of aU those who know more freely to impart to those who 
know less. The very effort to teach, the prej^aration, the 
study of the Scripture, and prayer, will do any Christian 
more good than hstenmg to a hundred sermons. 

Probably, however, the prayer and conference meetings 
exhibit most simply and directly the imiversal priesthood 
of the Churches of Christ. For the power of these meet- 
ings consists in bringmg together the testimony of so 
many witnesses to the truth as it is in Jesus ; and through 



BAPTIST CHUKCH GO VEENMEJS'T. 345 

the prayers tliey offer, the exhortations of men in all the 
various and different walks of life, the melodies in which 
they unite — all who attend are surrounded, as it were, on 
every side with an atmosphere of piety and holiness. 

For an instance of still other kinds of useful priestly 
labors, let any one turn to the life of Harlan Page or of 
Howard. It is through duties such as all of these, not by 
pastors alone, but by all the people, that the Church of 
Christ puts on her beautiful garments, shakes herself from 
the dust and sloth of centuries, and comes forth arrayed in 
all the beauty of the priestly robes conferred by Christ. 

In nature, the elements, when most silent, are most po- 
tential ; and in grace these quiet, ever-working, wide-spread 
influences are the great hope of evangelical religion for 
ages yet in the future. It has not been by set sermons 
against Popery that Roman Catholics have been converted 
in this country, and yet by personal Christian influence and 
superior weight of character more than two millions have 
been drawn from this soul-destroying system, in the United 
States, within the last half-century, and the deadliest 
wound been inflicted on the head of the beast, that Anti- 
christ has received since the Reformation. This spirit, 
however variously manifested, is in reality one. It is the 
jjower of the priesthood residing in every oneinher of the 
lohole Church, As it is cherished or neglected, every other 
gift and grace fluctuates. 

But, without fear of contradiction, the Baptists may 
claim that their principles recognize this power beyond any 
other Christian denomination. 

There are tliree of their essential and characteristic fea- 
tures which eminently lead to this result. First, 2'he shn- 
pllcity of their form of cJutrch government, in which there 

15* 



346 SPIRITUAL CHUBCH MEMBERSHIP. 

is no tiling done that is not subject to the w\R of the whole 
Church. Neither the vote of a non-professing or uncon- 
verted laity, nor the smgie voice of a dictatorial bishop can 
lord it over God's heritage, or fetter the priesthood and the 
peer-age (^. 6., the equality) of all the true sons of God, in 
their Father's house. The pastor is the presiding officer, 
but not the priest, of the Christian Church. He can not 
overrule its voice which is now, mth the Baptists, as an- 
ciently with all, supreme. Xor can one Church overrule 
another, for each is independent. They consult and coun- 
sel as brethren, but can not command or dictate. Xow, as 
we have shown before, no other denommation in this coun- 
try can, upon the scale of a hundred years, claim the whole 
of this as true of them. 

Secondly, This would, however, be unpossible or disas- 
trous if it were not for the sjnritual character of the mem- 
hership of Baptist Churches. If the members were re- 
ceived by birthright as the Quakers are, or by infant bap- 
tism upon the hope and presumption that they would grow 
up Christians — if upon any other basis than that of a credi- 
ble experience of a work of grace sanctifying their hearts 
such as that upon which alone baptism is properly adminis- 
tered, the membership could not be trusted with such pow- 
ers. The holy priesthood being mixed up with worldly 
masses would not be discernable nor capable of acting with 
efficiency. Hence just in proportion as other denominations 
have nullified their infant baptism and become more sjDirit- 
ual in their membership, just in proportion as they have 
come round to what Dr. Bushnell rightly terms " the Bap- 
tist theory of Church membershi]^" have they also claimed 
and exercised the powers of this universal jDriesthood. 

Third, Again Baptists test all their religion by the ob- 



BAPTISTS AISTD POLITICAL LIBERTY. 347 

vioiis meaning of the New Testament^ vitalized only by a 
personal experience of its divine truths, just as the blood 
carries life into every part vitalized only by the oxygen 
gas we mhale. This simplicity gives them great advantage 
in point of efficiency and pov/er. Engrossed as most per- 
sons are in other pursuits, and without theological educa- 
tion, any complicated system reliant on studies beyond their 
research must make them dependent upon authorities and 
teachers, preventing the full measure of that boldness and 
confidence so essential to success, but which the clear and 
conscientious obedience to all known truth ever inspires. 
This gives simplicity of plan and unity of result in all es- 
sential principles, with the largest liberty and variety of 
methods in meeting complicated and various details. In 
exact proportion as Christian denominations walk by these 
rules, will be their comprehensiveness and their usefulness, 
their orthodoxy at heart and the catholicity of their charity. 



CHAPTER IV. 

BAPTIST PRINCIPLES FAVORABLE TO POLITICAL LIBERTY. 

Before closing this work it will be appropriate to trace 
the progress during the past century of Baptist Principles 
in connection with those of Free Government. 

Dr. Arnold well remarked that after forty, no wise man 
was so anxious for the people to acquire more liberty as to 
be fitted for more. In proportion as tliere is preparedness 
for freedom, liberty will soon follow inevitably, and Avherc 
that is absent it can not last if acquired. Hence the natural 



348 PHYSICAL, I]S'TELLECTUAL, AND 

and necessary connection between true religion and civil 
liberty. It and it alone prepares man for freedom. '' If 
the Son sball make you free," said the Saviour, " ye shall 
be free uideed." And so far free government must rest 
essentially upon a religious basis. Freedom without Gov- 
ernment is anarchy, as mere government A\ithout freedom 
is tyranny. But in pure religion Vv^e find perfect freedom 
consisting with perfect government, the internal nature of 
m^an harmonized with his external relations. Here, there- 
fore, is the type of all free government among men. And 
hence there is no truth so well illustrated by all history, es- 
pecially modern history, as this, that every successful strug- 
gle for religious freedom has been followed either by a cor- 
responding political struggle, or else by a large conceded 
increase of civil liberty. 

We are at times liable to look upon the Church of Christ 
as a merely spiritual institution, one so exclusively intended 
to promote man's eternal interests that we lose sight of its 
importance to his temporal welfare. Each nation has ever 
founded its hopes on some peculiar excellence belonging to 
its institutions. But for permanence no principle of cohe- 
rence has been found at all comparable to that of true re- 
hgion. Some nations have prided themselves \\i)on jyhy steal 
poioer for success, but time demonstrates that alone is not 
enough to preserve it from decay. Others have relied on 
intellectual greatness only. Voltaire announced this to the 
world as the sum of his philosophy. " Error and ignorance 
are the sole causes of the misfortunes of the human race." 
The French Revolution was wrought out on the idea that 
nothing but knowledge was requisite to make man free and 
happy. But intellectual cultivation was tliei'e pro^-ed as it 
has been by the history of the whole world, to be but too 



MOKAL SOURCES OF POWEIi. 34^ 

consistent with moral depravation ; and thus the spread of 
knowledge became but the diffusion of corruption. Enough 
this to show that knowledge alone, or even when united with 
the highest bravery and skiU in arms, is not enough to pre- 
serve a nation's prosperity. Bacon says, " in the infancy of 
a State arms prevail, in its maturity arms and arts for a 
short season, in its decline commerce and the mechanic 
arts." 

One source of national strength alone remains to be no- 
ticed. It is moral and religions poicer. The history of the 
Jews with their theocratic government was an illustration 
of this. The motto of their powder w^as " righteousness ex- 
alteth a nation." Though a small people, though naturally 
narrow-minded, though not warUke in disposition and 
policy after arriving in Palestine, they flourished in propor- 
tion as they adhered to the j^rinciple on which their strength 
was founded, and only perished when they had utterly lost 
all true religion, and turned their backs on faith in the pur- 
suit of ritualism. 

In the institutions of this country, all of the three ele- 
ments named, physical, mental, and moral power have been 
in a singular manner united and balanced by being left free. 
The hardy exercise of clearing the forests has increased the 
average stature of the men more than an inch above that of 
the parent stock. The exertions necessary to subdue the 
Indians and wild beasts, have given them courage in the 
use of arms, and ready habits of warfare. Free schools, 
colleges, and newspapers, have carried forward the intellect 
of the masses proportionably. 

Now, in accounting fur the prosperity of this country, 
some will select the strengtli and courage of tlie peo])le, 
the extensive forests and iields for tlieui to spread them- 



350 THE KIXGDO^I OF CHP.IST. 

selves in, and attribute to that soiu*ee all its success. 
Otliers will select the spread of knowledge and newspapers, 
and attribute every thing to that. We fear, then, that in 
the midst of all this, one, and the chief element of the 
prosperity of this country, is in danger of beiog overiooked, 
i. e.^ the moral and religious principles of its forefethers. 

That sentiment which David put uito the mouth of Israel 
three thousand years ago, needs often to be repeated — 
" Some trust iu chariots, and some in horses, but we will 
trust iu the name of our God." It may be well to show 
the poicer of pure Christianity in raising a nation to 
greatness^ and securing its happiness. 

Of all the mischievous aUiances that man ever conceived, 
the union of Church and State has been the most prolific of 
iU consequences to both. There is, however, no error but 
some truth hes at the bottom of it, and while the imion of 
the Church to the State is a sad error, the adherence of 
a nation to great rehgious principles is the principal source 
of its strength. 

Xational governments have generally undertaken to rule 
men just in the reverse way from the Church, and miserable 
work have they made of it. They have governed mainly 
by force, by aiToies, by poHce, and by stringent laws, until 
society in the old world writhes in its agony, and is all 
ready to drop to pieces. 

The Chm'ch of Christ imdertakes to govern man by love, 
by conscience, by exhibiung what is right and true, by con- 
ferring it5 privileges only on the good — and it flourishes and 
increases. Xapoleon, speaking of the kingdom of Christ, 
said, " We rest the creations of oiu- genius upon force, Jesus 
Christ alone founded his empne upon love, and at this mo- 
ment miUions of men would die for him ." 



ITS POWER. 351 

There is not a Christian but must have felt the strange 
contrast which there is between the kingdom of Christ and 
most other kingdoms that have yet seen the Hght of the 
sun. Its objects seem so different, and its methods so dif- 
ferent, while yet it accomplishes all the great ends, even the 
earthly ends of government better than any other institu- 
tion. It does more to assist men and put within their reach 
the best means of promotmg their happiness, prosperity, 
and protection. 

Go into some neighborhood where vice most prevails, 
and social order is least preserved, where all that makes a 
community virtuous, industrious, and happy, is set the most 
completely at defiance. Go with laws, with constables, 
with magistrates, and soldiers, and can you rectify the dis- 
orders of that community as you can by planting a Church 
of Christ, opening the doors of a house of worship, training 
the young in Sabbath-schools, and exhorting the old to 
reformation and penitence? Gather the community to- 
gether to adore their Creator and repent of their sins, form 
the Christians into a holy brotherhood, and it will soon ap- 
pear that there is no power on earth equal to it. And yet 
it is a power of which the nations of mankind have very 
little real conception. 

If ever there was a time when it was palpable to all man- 
kind that there is something radically wrong and rotten at 
the root of most of the old systems of government, this is 
the time. Like a row of dominoes which children set on 
end, and make one fall against another till the whole drop, 
so are most of the kingdoms of Europe and Asia tottering, 
jostling, and crashing against each other at tliis time. From 
the only unagitated spot, one may say, in the civiHzed world, 
we in this country calmly survey this state of things without 



352 OKIGIX OF SELF-GOYERXMEXT 

cause of alarm, if we can but adhere only to the principles 
on which the nation was constituted. 

Xow, it can easily be shown that it is rehgion — the re- 
ligion of Christ that has given to this country the germ of 
her present happmess and institutions, makmg her political 
importance what it is. What was New England originally 
but a live coal shot out from the volcano of the Reformation ? 
It was the hving embodiment of principles struck out in the 
heat and fires of those tremendous throes of religious opinion 
which agitated England from Henry YIII. to Charles. II. 
Rights of conscience which seemed visionary and impractic- 
able in the Old World were here tested and proved not im- 
practicable for the Xew. The basis of the modern civil 
liberties of this country (and of Europe) may all be traced 
back to speculations upon religious libei'ty and the rights of 
conscience. The Declaration of Independence was but the 
public announcement of a thing, the germ of which had 
existed long before. The American principles of self-gov- 
ernment in the State originated in self-government in the 
Church. The idea of choosing officers and settling every 
thing peaceably by the vote of the majority, was evidently 
derived, in this country, from the custom of thus electing 
Church officers, and of thus arranging all religious matters, 
m Holland. The Church mthout a prelate went before the 
State without a king. The germ and basis of those political 
institutions which here have j^roduced so much happiness 
may be found in the Church and toM^i meetings of the New 
England colonies long enough prior to the Revolution. 

In fact, the history of self-government in America may be 
traced back to its origin, in 1620, when the voyagers of the 
May Flower on landhig, finding themselves out of the 
colony of Virginia, signed a paper, mutually promising to 



IN AMERICA. 353 

submit to all such "just and equal laws and ordinances" 
as should from time to time be thought most convenient 
for the common good.^ 

What alone were wanting in Massachusetts — full religious 
liberty, safe guarantees for the rights of the minority 
against the tyranny of the majority, and separation of Church 
and State, were supplied by Roger Williams, drawing his 
idea of a Church from the New Testament alone. It was 
the reserved rights of each, first completely conceived and 
struggled for in this country by Roger Williams, that be- 
came the foundation of the perfect civil liberties and indi- 
vidual rights secured to each in this land. 

In 1638, a solemn covenant was, in like manner, signed 
by Roger Williams and his associates to submit to the 
orders of "the major part," but " in civil things o?z/y."^ 
The Charter from King Charles, which he afterward secured, 
was obtained chiefly to protect themselves from the en- 
croachments of Massachusetts. 

We have only to read the Acts of the Apostles, and see 
the model of this Republic of Independent States in those 
spiritual communities scattered here and there over Pales- 
tine, and extending through Asia Minor and Egypt, until 
they filled the whole Roman empire. Those Churches so 
dependent upon Christ, yet so independent of the whole 
world beside, peaceably choosing their own officers, and 
managing their own aflairs, counseling like brothers, and 
fraternizing without interfering with each other's independ- 
ence and reserved rights ; those Churches of Christ and his 
Apostles gave to the world the idea of that new kind of 
civil government which now stands in such a happy contrast 
to the moldering thrones of the Okl World. 

* Ilildreth, vol. i. p. 159. 2 nUdrelb, vol. i. p. 256. 



354 ORIGIX OF 

The right of the majority to govern, was in ISTew Eng- 
land, taught the State by all the Congregational Churches 
in common. But the reserved rights of the mhiority on 
all matters about which there could be conscientious 
scruples were first declared to this Continent by the Bap- 
tist colony of Rhode Island. As a smgular illustration 
of the whole of this, it should not be forgotten that the 
Charter, drawn up on principles suggested by Roger Wil- 
hams, survived the Revolution of 1776, and remamed the 
Constitution of that State imtil A^dthm a very recent period. 
There is no other civilized government on the face of the 
earth that changed so little m its constitution in those two 
hundred years, wliile yet altering so largely and so pros- 
perously in all outward circumstances. 

If from the intellectual origin we turn now to the prac- 
tical development of libert}', it was in Virginia that the 
resolutions of 1765, against the Stamp Act, carried througli 
by Patrick Henry, brought to a crisis the great struggle 
for liberty. And it is the history of liberal views, m the 
most originally aristocratic of the colonies, which will best 
illustrate the bearmg of religious opinions on the civil con- 
stitution of a people. 

In 1745 a company of !N"ew England Baptists settled in 
Virginia, from whose extraordinary zeal nearly the whole 
of the Baptists of the South and South-west, now num- 
bermg more than half a million of communicants, have 
since sprung. They first undermined the union of Church 
and State in Virginia. A religious revolution precisely on 
the same principles as the pohtical one which followed, took 
place Avhen Patrick Henry overthrew the established clergy 
in the parson's cause. It was this success that gave him 
weisfht and enabled him to unite the aristocracy with the 



AMERICAISr IlSTDEPEKDEISrCE. 355 

masses of the people (two thirds of whom were now dis- 
senters), in the revolutionary resolutions against the Stamp 
Act. He turned the popular feeling of the State in pre- 
cisely the same way against British interference with politi- 
cal liberty in the latter case, as against her infringement 
upon religious liberty in the former. 

The carrying of those resolutions against the Stamp Act 
was the turning point of the question of revolution, and no 
one could or would have fought that through but the man 
who had already led on successfully the former revolution- 
ary struggle/ But for his popularity Avith the people, both 
his resolutions and himself would have shared a very dif- 
ferent fate* It was what he had gained in the religious 
contest that enabled him to hold the aristocracy of Vir- 
ginia to the cause of the people ; and this united the whole 
weight and hifluence of that colony, then the largest from 
the outset, in the cause of the Revolution. But for all 
these causes combining, the Stamp Act would have been 
submitted to. And all through the early part of that 
struggle, it was Patrick Henry's devotion to religious 
liberty that drew round him no unimportant measure of 
his personal popularity and influence. He became the open 
and voluntary legal defender of the Baptists, and from the 
very first, as all historians agree, the Baptists, to a man, 
united in espousing the cause of the Revolution. They 
were of all classes foremost in their labors and sufferings 
for its achievement. Throughout the whole country from 
Georgia to Massachusetts, as Backus^ and others have 
shown, they were every where pubUcly committed to the 
cause beyond any other reUgious denomination, and as such 
their houses of worship were defaced or destroyed, and their 
* See ante, p. 51. ^ Backus, ch. xi. p. 196. 



356 JEFFERSOX 

congregations subjected to unusual persecutions wherever 
the British forces came. Their sons joined the army, and 
their ministers acted as chaplams to the troops. 

Jefferson in Virginia did more than most others to give 
a scientific and formal cast to the prmciples of Uberty 
in Virginia, and thus largely to the United States ; and it 
is not unimportant to show how he obtained some of his 
ideas. From the experiments and failures of the ancient 
Greek Repubhcs he unquestionably got many of the checks 
and balances of his opinions. But he, no less than Patrick 
Henry, got liis first clear conceptions of a free civil consti- 
tution from observation of the results of freedom of con- 
science. Religious government as exhibited by Baptist 
Churches taught him the form of government best suited 
to the United States. There was a small Baptist Church 
which held its monthly meetings for busmess at a short dis- 
tance from Mr. Jefferson's house, eight or ten years before 
the American Revolution. Mr. Jefferson attended these 
meetings for several months in succession. The pastor on 
one occasion asked him how he was pleased with their 
Church government ? Mr. Jefferson repHed that it struck 
him with great force, and had interested him much, that he 
considered it the only form of true democracy then exist- 
ing in the worlds and had concluded that it would be the 
best plan of government for the American colonies. This 
was several years before the Declaration of Independence. 
This practical exhibition of religious liberty and equality 
would seem then to have operated on Mr. Jefferson's mmd 
no little m forming those principles of civil freedom and 
government which he afterward so ably developed and ad-^ 
vocated. 

There has been a question raised whether it was not a 



FREE GOVEEXMENT 357 

Presbyterian Church ui the neighborhood, that Jefferson 
attended for this purpose. Though a matter of no great 
consequence, it may not be improper to remark that a gen- 
tleman of the highest respectabiUty, and well known in 
North Carolina, told the writer that his attention having 
been called to the statement, and he knowing that the 
venerable Mrs. Madison had some recollections on the sub- 
ject, asked her in regard to them. She expressed a distinct 
remembrance of Mr. Jefferson speaking on the subject, and 
always declaring that it was a JBaptist Church from which 
these ^dews were gathered. Indeed a moment's reflection 
would show that it could hardly have been any other. For 
in no Presbyterian Church is the business ever transacted 
in the presence of those who are not members, it being all 
conducted by " the session," as it is called, consisting only 
of the officers of the Church and uniformly in private. 

The conception, the faith that calls things into existence, 
the confidence of the practicability of a free govermnejit^ 
whose ultimate earthly power is vested in the masses of the 
community — this idea was plainly obtained by Jefferson 
himself, from a small Baptist Church, meeting month after 
month to govern itself by the laws of the Xew Testament, 
in his own neighborhood. It was certainly the Baptist 
Churches of this country who were the first to suggest and 
to maintain those ideas of religious liberty, and of conse- 
quent limitations upon the power of the majority to inter- 
fere mth the rights of the minority, which form some of 
the most sacred features of American liberty.^ 

It was thus, in more general terms, tlie Church that gave 
men in this country a faith in self-government, and a knowl- 
edge of the only way in which it could be maintahied — a 
1 Seo aute, p. 66. 



358 REYOLUTIOXS UNSUCCESSFUL 

faith and a knowledge that have not taken root in Europ 
but which are now at work Hke leaven, and must work^ 
until the happiness of nations has grown out of it. 

The American Revolution, however, was but the firing of 
a signal gun for a camjDaign of liberty in Europe, of which no 
mortal can even yet begin to see the end. The first French 
Revolution was the immediate result ; an attempt to imi- 
tate in France what had been accomplished in America. 
But there was this important distinction at the outset, 
which made all the difference in its immediate results — the 
people had never been used to self-government in religion, 
and therefore were unprepared for it m politics. They had 
particularly never received the ideas of Roger Williams, as 
to the sacredness of conscience, and the reserved rights of 
the soul. Hence they were unprepared to conceive of true 
political liberty, or the constitutional rights of each man 
reserved to hun against the anarchical oppression of a ma- 
jority. They had no pure rehgion, and therefore could 
have no true liberty. They had infidel philosophy on one 
hand, and Papal superstition on the other ; the Missal in- 
stead of the Bible, and the confessional in the place of 
family worship, an unscrupulous Jesuitical priesthood instead 
of a pure and Gospel Church. 

It is not in every page of history that this lesson can be 
so clearly and demonstrably traced out, as just here. In 
ordinary times, and among common men, the secret forces 
v\diich the religion of a land is ever exerting, are hardly 
perceptible ; just as the constant vitalizing influence of elec- 
tricity momentarily at work is not usually perceived, but 
only the occasional thunder-cloud. Does a land prosper ? 
men bless the wisdom of their o^vn schemes, their educa- 
tion, their laws, their enterj^rise, their liberties, all these 



WITHOUT RELIGION. 359 

secondary causes are brought forth in turn, and worshiped, 
just as of old they cried out by the space of three hours, 
" Great is Diana of the Ephesians !" while yet the First 
cause, the cause of all other causes of prosperity, is forgotten. 

But what are any of these without the vitalizing agency 
of a pure and simple religion to regulate them and give 
them sufficiency ? What is education ? Knowledge truly 
is power, but power of evil to the bad ; of good only to the 
good. Who would msh to see every tyrant become a 
giant, and a razor in the hands of every madman ? Yet such 
is knowledge to a people without virtue and piety. What 
can law effect ? It requires good men to make good laws, 
a good community to support them, and a good heart to 
love them. What is liberty itself with all its sweets, to the 
reckless and unprincipled ? The veriest bubble that ever 
child blew. Indeed those arrangements which are best, so 
long as a majority remain on the side of virtue, are worst 
where, as in the city of Paris, the majority become corrupt. 
ISJ'ot one, nor all things beside can make a land either great 
or happy. Living religion is the real source of this nation's 
prosperity — that only can make its truly wise and philo- 
sophical arrangements work successfully. We hazard 
nothing in saying that this country owes more to the prayers 
and the piety of its ancestry, than it does even to their 
valor and their wisdom, great as they were. And each de- 
nomination and each Christian, in proportion as they con- 
tribute to a pure religion, make the most valuable oifering 
to civil liberty. 

As in prosperity men exult in the wisdom of their own 
schemes, instead of glorying in the only wise God, so in 
adversity they can see no cause for the disruptions of civil 
commotions, or the sudden panics and fluctuations of com- 



360 FIRST FREIS^CH RE YOLUTI OIS^. 

merce, beyond excess of trade, fictitious capital, the con- 
duct of the banks, or the pohtical mismanagement of other 
nations. But the man of piety perceives a cause far above 
all these. He sees generally some great religious principle 
violated. The people of America or of England have 
hastened to be rich, perchance, and they have not been mno- 
cent ; or those of Italy have trampled on the rights of con- 
science, and civil liberty lies prostrate. The powers of the 
Old World have become steeped in luxury and extravagance, 
and those of the IsTew World, perhaps, are not free from 
political corruption. Just where the wisdom of the wise 
man fails him, and the intelligence of the prudent man 
is brought to naught, and can suggest no remedy, the 
Christian "has understanding of the times to know what 
Israel ought to do." 

All the disasters and failures, all the horrors and excesses 
of the first French Revolution, are distinctly attributable 
to the want of a true religion in the hearts of the masses, 
and were at length traced to it most clearly and distinctly 
by the very Frenchmen who first tamed this wild political 
chaos.^ 

What is the whole history of Spain but a repetition of 
the same great lesson, that liberty can not flourish in the 
State until men are first accustomed to use and to improve 
it in religion ? 

In England, where pohtical hberty has slowly but steadily 
advanced, it has been preceded by a firm and correspond- 
ing progress of reUgious freedom. The repeal of the Test 
and Corporation Acts characteristically went before the 
Reform Bill, and rendered it inevitable. 

The special connection of the Baptists in Europe with aU 
' Alison's History of Europe, vol. ii. p. 200. Harper. 



KOBEET HALL AND DK. RYLAND. 361 

the great movements in favor of liberty, has been one 
which can never give them cause to blush. During the 
Revolutionary War, and after Lord Chatham had deserted 
the cause of the Colonies, the English Baptists remained 
fast friends to their liberties, and this even while Eng- 
land was carrying on the war; and it is a fact not unworthy 
of notice and of record, that Robert Hall seems to have 
received the conception of the very finest passage he ever 
uttered in the pulpit, or wrote with his pen, from hearing 
his father and Dr. Ryland, two Baptist ministers, advocat- 
ing the merits of the Revolutionary cause ^ — a passage 
considered by the best judges as " unsurpassed by any pro- 
duction of modern or of ancient orators." 

If from England we turn to the Continent, almost every 
kingdom of Europe has, within the last ten years, been on 
the eve of overthrowing its monarch. The chief reason 
why so little progress has been made toward liberty is the 
dread of that infidel, red republicanism, which threatens 
the destruction of the whole social system. Men wisely, in 
such circumstances, prefer the known evils of much tyranny 
to the unknown abuses of utter anarchy. France, the ex- 
periment-making nation for Europe, has tried both. 

But if now it should be asserted that this connection be- 
tween Baptists and liberal principles has been of an acci- 
dental nature, or if it should be demanded what great re- 
ligious truths are held by them peculiarly favorable to a 
true and yet judicious attaclnnent to liberty, we need only 
remind the reader of some of the principles which ^ve have 
shown to belong to them universally and eminently, 

1. Their reliance on the Bihle^ and the Bible alone^ as their 
rule of faith and practice. This has led them to do every 

1 See Appendix F. p. 41 1, 
16 



362 THE BIBLE AND FKEEDOM. 

thing to 2^1ace it in the hands of the whole world, and has 
done more to identify them with the cause of true liberty, 
more for the progress of mankind, than all the speculations 
of philosophers. 

The freest nations are those which have the Bible most 
thoroughly inwrought into the texture of their constitu- 
tions ; not trusting to mere natural religion, on the one 
hand, or to the Canon Law of Roman Catholicism on the 
othe]*. If we take, for mstance. Christian nations as a 
Avhole, and compare them with the heathen kingdoms of 
the earth, there can be no question but that science, litera- 
ture, art, national power, individual security, and social 
happiness greatly preponderate among Christian people. 
But if w^e look among nominally Christian nations, and 
ask where is the greatest amount of true liberty, happiness, 
and rapid national advancement, the answer must come 
back, that it is in those nations and in that proportion in 
which the Bible, the true text-book of Christianity, is most 
circulated. The Vv^hole history of the world shows that 
atheism on the one hand, and superstition on the other, 
destroy liberty in any nation. 

2. The recognition of inalienable rights is the basis of all 
freedom, and the mndication of the rights of conscience has 
done more for the liberties of mankind than can easily be 
estunated. 

As we have seen, any bold achievement in favor of re- 
ligious freedom has always been followed by corresponding 
successes to temporal liberty. The English Reformation 
in rehgion was the basis of modern English and American 
freedom. 

Hence the vindication of the inaUenable rights of con- 
science by Roger WiUiams, and their practical declaration 



THE REFUGE OF HUMAN RIGHTS. 363 

by the Baptists in Virginia, did so niiicli to prepare the way 
for those assertions of the abstract rights of citizens which 
have been among the characteristic features of American 
liberty. 

Liberty of conscience has ever^been the last refuge and 
hiding-place of all the other rights of man. Hence has it al- 
ways been the most persecuted and hated by tyrants. Nor 
is it to be questioned that Roger Williams and all those 
Baptists before him, who asserted the sacredness of " soul 
liberty" did in that thing strike the boldest stroke at all 
tyranny, and establish most firmly the base of all future 
successful operations against despotism. Liberty of speech 
on other subjects, and finally liberty of action grow natural- 
ly by degrees out of this. Men must ever be educated for 
liberty before they will know how to use it without infring- 
ing the rights of others. Religious freedom prepared 
and trained this nation for the use. of civil liberty, by the 
happy and considerate acknowledgment of the just rights 
of all others. A nation not thus trained, like France, found 
it impossible to be free, because not apprenticed to this con- 
siderate use of its liberty. 

3. Ajid still more directly are Baptist institutions power- 
fully friendly to free civil government by the form of their 
own ecclesiastical organizations. A person looking at the 
various denominations in this country superficially, might be 
disposed to believe that the religious and civil governments 
of a people have no necessary connection with each other. 
But yet nothing is more certain and demonstrable than that 
there is a constant tendency in the two to approach each 
other. In the time of Constantino the government of the 
Church gradually assumed the form of that of the State, 
the ranks of the hierarchy and the divisions of its metro- 



364 CHANGES IN CHURCH GOYERXMEXT. 

politan dioceses and patriarchites, corresponding ynth simi- 
lar divisions in the Roman Empire. By degrees Rome Pa- 
gan was broken in pieces, but Rome Papal grasped the 
power it had dropped, sat itself in the vacant chair and still 
imitates, on a sj^iritual scgle, as nearly as it can, the ancient 
temjDoral sway. 

But notwithstanding all its boasted unity there is much 
divergence in its practical government in exact correspond- 
ence ^ith the political institutions of the various lands into 
which it is extended. In the United States, for instance, 
notwithstandmg all the efforts of bishops, and councils, 
and legates, we find a variety of the Roman Catholic re- 
ligion sjDringing up vastly different from that even of Ire- 
land. We find lay trustees of Cathohc Churches capable, 
sometimes by themselves, of resisting the priesthood. We 
find the Douay Bible more generally permitted, sermons 
more frequent and confessions more rare. 

In the Episcopal Church of this country again the laity 
have secured to them, by canons and constitutions, rights 
quite unkno^m to the Church of England. On the other 
hand the State, in hke manner, in a great measure imbibes, 
by a kind of capillary attraction, its constitutions ^om the 
religious forms of government to which men are accustomed. 
Thus the centralization of Enghsh EjDiscopal power in the 
See of Canterbury helped in no small degree to unite the 
Heptarchy into one nation. Nor is it without some found- 
ation that an analogy has been supposed to exist between 
the three orders in the English Church, and the three or- 
ders in the British Constitution. It is not, therefore, by 
accident, but by the natural and inevitable tendency of things 
that the self-government of the Churches of New England 
led to self-government in the civil institutions, wrought out 



SUMMARY 365 

by the Revolution of 1776, or that led even the free-think- 
ing Jefferson, in Virginia, to look forward before the Revo- 
lution to the Baptist form of chui'ch government, then just 
becoming popular with the masses, because most free, as the 
pattern of the future civil government of the Colonies. 



CONCLUDING CHAPTER. 

We commenced this volume by tracing the history of the 
struggle for religious liberty entered into by the Baptists 
single-handed and alone, and we have seen the principles 
for which they suffered not only nationalized in this coun- 
try and engrossed into its very Constitution, but rapidly 
spreading throughout Europe, rescuing the Mazzinis in 
Naples from the power of the priests, and Achilli from the • 
dungeons of the Inquisition in Rome. It has penetrated 
the Mosque of St. Sophia in Constantinople, sheathing for- 
ever the persecuting sword of the false prophet. 

We have seen, too. Baptist principles the means of reviv- 
ing, in other denominations, the requirement of personal 
piety to Church fellowship, until it has made individual 
choice before full communion, the most distinguishing and 
obvious feature of American Christianity. 

We have seen the influence of this denommation in chang- 
ing the most firmly estabhshed religious usages of society, 
and banishing infant sprinkling to such an extent that per- 
haps not one infant in ten, born in the United States, is 
now the subject of this ceremony where, a liundred years 
ago, hardly one in ten was left uninitiated. The change 
thus wrought constitutes one of the most powerful revolu- 



366 SUMMARY. 

tions as to the terms of Christian Church membership that 
have taken place in a thousand years. 

We have seen not only the principles but the practices 
of the Baptists extending to such a degree that, in addition 
to the very large nmnber of persons rejecting infant bap- 
tism in other Churches, a quarter of the whole church ac- 
commodation of the United States is in the hands of those 
who immerse adults only in baptism/ 

We have seen this denomination originating those for- 
eign missionary enterprises of modern evangelization which 
are at this moment producing such astonishing effects upon 
the nations of the East, dasliing the empire of China in 
pieces as a potter's vessel, and destined apparently to bring 
about the latter-day millennial glories of the Christian cause. 
Their ministers were the first to suggest and engage in 
those gigantic labors of modern Bible circulation, which 
have published ten times more copies of the w^ord of God 
in the last fifty years than all which were put in circulation 
in the previous eighteen hundred, translating the Bible into 
the languages of a proportionably greater number of the 
inhabitants of the world. 

We have seen their views of religious liberty and the 

^ The last census shows the whole number of the houses of worship 
for the United States to be 38,061, capable of seating 14,234,825, of this 
number, i. e., 10,341 houses of worship, capable of seating 3,5*76,199 per- 
sons, are held b}^ churches practicing adult immersion as the only Chris- 
tian baptism. Those Christians who practice mixed communion are in 
this estimate mostly counted with the Pedobaptists. I have here included 
the Camj^bellites (who do not, however, exceed in number those Baptists 
in sentiment who are in other denominations), but if they are omitted, it 
will not essentially vary the result since without them a quarter of the 
whole houses of worship in this country, wanting only seventeen, are 
Baptists. 



A DEEP FOUNDATIOK. l 367 

reserved rights of conscience made tlie pattern of the lib- 
erties and reserved rights of each citizen, and their very 
forms of Church government examined by free-thinking 
philosophers and statesmen, and, after mature deliberation, 
declared to be suggestive of the best form of government 
for the people of the United States. Such has been the 
progress and such have been some of the effects of Baptist 
principles during the past hundred years. 

It surely must be proper and important to trace all 
this on the ground of historic truth. The history of a doc- 
trine of principle is far more valuable than that of a sect. 
A full account of the Baptists as a denomination has not 
been the object of this volume. But the history of the 
spread of their principles is far more important to the 
world, more demonstrative of their truth or falsehood, and 
more indicative of their future progress, and that of those 
who uphold them. The men who originate the most im- 
portant movements, seldom are the men to record them. 
Those who achieve the materials for history, seldom stop to 
write them doAvn. Thus far Baptists have wrought rather 
than written. They have dug a deep foundation, running 
under ground through the history of Christianity in the 
world and resting on the Rock of Ages. But as a denomi- 
nation they have not occupied its pages mth a description 
of the lofty erections which they have reared. As in the 
construction of some large building it takes months to dig 
away the rubbish, and lay the foimdations firm so that the 
building seems long in reaching the level of the surround- 
ing earth, while after that, it soon api)ears as a lofty edifice 
that shall stand for ages ; so tlius far the progress of the 
Baptists has been sIoav and laborious, while removing errors 
and prejudices from the minds of nations so as to get a 



368 DANGEROUS ATTACKS. 

clear space and settled foundation, upon wliich to build. 
But tliat work accomplished, the rest becomes certain, easy 
and enduriiig. As the historian Neander once remarked, 
" There is a future for you Baptists." 

And further, it has ajDpeared to the author proper to ex- 
hibit these developments because many of those principles 
upon which it had been supposed that all Protestants were 
agreed, have of late years been made the objects of subtler 
and more dangerous attack than ever before — these attacks 
usually coming from those who were themselves, in their 
religious antecedents, leaders in all the evangelical move- 
ments among our Pedobaptist brethren. Infant baptism is 
also the chief mstrument in all these opposing movements. 
In the hands of the sons of a Wilberforce it is the lever by 
which they and multitudes more, prejudiced against dissent, 
would upheave Protestantism from the foundation of the 
Apostles and prophets ; in those of Dr. Nevin it conducts 
to a High Church ground, equally fatal to evangelical piety 
in others, though not, perhaps, in him. It is time to show 
historically that on the scale of a hundred years, the most 
consistent, durable, and reliable plan for an evangelical 
Church is that of baptism upon a credible jDrofession of 
personal faith. 

But further, this historical sketch of Baptist principles is 
also written for the sake of many of the Pedobaptist breth- 
ren in Christ, who are truly evangelical in spirit, who ab- 
hor Romanism in all its forms ; who would rather give up 
infant baptism than encourage Popery, but who also view 
the Baptists as men doting about questions and strifes to 
no profit, magnifying little matters and making a mere cer- 
emony the foundation of a sect. 

We may ask such candidly if underlying the simple 



TUIC PKOPEIi KEMEDY 369 

fo7'iris which Baj)ti8t« profess, there is rK)t a deep and dis- 
tinctive theory, clear and evangelical, embodying what is 
vital, necessary, and consistent to Christian visible Church 
membership in the greatest simplicity — if experience has 
not proved the importance of our principles not only to 
ourselves but to the age in which we live. In looking for- 
ward to the unknown future, and all the possible changes 
and coiTuptions anticipated by such men as Bunsen, likely 
to take place, it may be asked if these principles do not 
aiford the most scjcure and consistent platform on which to 
build Christian Churches. Indeed, seeing that Pedobap- 
tists can admit the validity of the initiatory rite as performed 
by Baptists, while they are unable to do the same in regard 
to that performed otherwise, it may be asked if there 
should not be a general return to the ancient practice of 
immersion indicated in the original command "'to JBap- 
tize''' — and if it could not be deferred altogether, until the 
time of personal and chosen faith, being now generally 
acknowledged to be incomplete without it. Then alone 
it can be valid, and, therefore, appropriate. Other denomi- 
nations may think it unnecessary and a weakness in Bap- 
tists to plead so strenuously for points tike these ; but they 
know from the experience of the past that these greatly 
involve the permanence of the evangelical system. 

Many are probably struggling for light upon their path 
of duty in this very respect. The general decline of infant 
baptism shows that this must be the case. The remarks 
and biograjjliies of many of the leading defenders of the 
system point to the same truth. When such a man as Dr. 
Bushnell tells lis that at tlie time of his ordination, so 
strong wei-e his doubts and so little coiiKl he find that was 
positively in favor of the system, that he came near being 



370 te:.iptatioxs of the exez^t. 

rejected from ordination, and could only at last find ground 
for it in a system which all his brethren give up as full of 
dangerous tendencies, surely there must be many who have 
his doubts without his method of resohung them. Dr. Alex- 
ander and one of liis fellow professors for some years had 
to give up the practice of infant baptism, and hesitated 
about the duty of joining the Baptists, and at last were de- 
terred chiefly by the dangerous idea that Baptist " notions 
of the purity of the Chm'ch" are "• too rigid^^^ and by a 
want of knowledge of Church history, which, though al- 
lowable enough forty years ago, every reader of Xeander 
or Augusti could at once supply. 

The writer was assured from a most authentic source, 
while in an Eastern city of the Union a few years age, that 
a late distinguished evangelical di\ine, whose name is fa- 
mihar to thousands, told a lady who applied to him with 
doubts upon the subject, that he himself had been much 
tried in the same way, but at last had concluded these 
were temptations of the enemy of souls, and had prayed 
against them as such. 

Should such doubts as to the truth of this or any other 
point of religious duty molest any of our Pedobai)tist 
brethren, nothing surely can be more ajDpropriate than to 
pray, but not as many excellent men do, prejudging while 
they pray. A more trusting spii'it, and the desire that God 
will lead them mto all truth, clear their mmds from mis- 
takes, and give them grace to tread boldly the ]3ath of 
duty ; faithful in that ichich is leasts as well as in that 
which appears greatest, is surely wiser. It was no tempta- 
tion of the Evil One that led Baptist Xoel lately to forsake 
the Church of England and become a Baptist. 

When a child is added to a Pedobaptist family, it is 



AM I BAPTIZED. 371 

probably dedicated by the pious parents to God in prayer, 
before any thoughts about a christening occur. But at last 
the question conies up for practical solution, " Shall ^ve 
present this child for baptism ?" and Scripture is sometimes 
hunted for proofs, and books and tracts are examined, only 
to discover how weak and insufficient they all appear in its 
support. The matter is suffered perhaps to lie over. An- 
other and another little one cause fresh remonstrance on 
the part of the minister, and fresh mvestigation on that of 
the parent, with the settled conviction now that there is no 
divine authority for infant baptism. 

Sometimes a sermon m defense of sprinkling leads to 
doubt,^ and the question, often stifled, comes plainly up, 
'' A7n J baptized, ^^'' And then the Christian finds that 

1 The following anecdote was given me by a gentleman who witnessed 
the scene, in South Carolina : — The Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyte- 
rians, in a small community, agreed to build a meeting-house in com- 
mon — preaching by turns. When it came to the turn of the Presbyte- 
rian minister, he said he felt it his duty to preach on baptism, and did 
so, remarking that he should give them the truth, and the whole truth, 
on the subject. In the course of his discourse he quoted Heb. x. 22 : 
" Having your hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience ;" and there he 
stopped. A little Grerman member of the Baptist church was sitting in 
one corner of the house. He could only speak broken English ; but, 
Bible in hand, he turned to each passage referred to. Observing the 
minister stop at ^^ conscience,^^ he continued out loud, ^^mid your todies 
vashed vith pure vater.^'' This much confused the minister, who to re- 
cover himself repeated his last sentence, " having your hearts sprinkled 
from an evil conscience ;" " and your bodies vashed vith pure vater^^* was 
again the response of the pertinacious German. The minister was so an- 
noyed that he wound up his discourse. The congregation all began to 
read for themselves, and several became Baptists. As for the little Gor- 
man, he defended himself by saying, " Vy do minister say ho vas going 
to give us de truth and do whole truth, and this vas do whole truth." 



372 EE:aAlXIXG ox SUFFZPvAXCE 

both the intention and the form, the faith and the ceremony 
of iniant spiiokling, are so completely distinct fi-om those of 
behever's baptism, that he is not. Some will tell him, that 
though originally imperfect, his fiiith and subsequent pro- 
fession have ratilied his baptism and made it vaUd. But he 
knows that no other instrument, so far departing, both in 
form and spiiit, from the prescribed standard, could be rati- 
fied by any subsequent act, but would have to be executed 
afi-esh. 

Others will urge that '' it is a matter of no importance." 
But he sees that if one sacrament is of no imj^ortance, 
neither is the other, neither are ^-isible Churches, nor minis- 
ters, nor Sabbaths — that all stand on the same level, and 
must stand or fall together — that, whatever may be then- 
importance to membership in the invisible Church, they 
essentially belong to visible Churches as such, and must be 
upheld " as they were delivered,-' or not at all. 

Some, hke Coleiidge, will claim a diecretionary power 
for the Church to alter and amend its own constitution. 
But this either makes it a merely human institution, a sim- 
ply volimtary Society, or else so divine a body that its au- 
thority equals that of the Savioiu' who founded it. 

Dissatisfied with every defense of infant baptism, a pious 
Pedobaptist will often apply to his mmister to baptize him. 
But then the pastor feels that by so domg he would ac- 
knowledge that all infant baptism might be reasonably re- 
garded as a nuUity. Sometimes this difficulty is got over, 
and the individual remains hi a Chm'ch m which he has but 
Httle influence, and is perhaps stripped of office on account 
of his views. He is peiToitted to remain, but only on suf- 
ferance, not on equal footing, while the whole influence of 
the Chui'ch is dii*ected to the support of infant sprinkling, 



AMONG PEDOBAPTISTS. 373 

by its sermons, catechisms, Sabbath-sciiool instruction, and 
the public administration of it as a Church rite. 

Where a person is already a member of an Evangelical 
Church, to which he is bound by many ties, he may easily 
think, possibly, that his duty lies rather among them than 
others. 

But then, perhaps, this further view of the case will pre- 
sent itself, that among the duties of the visible Churches is 
that of upholdmg ordinances^ keeping them as they Avere 
originally delivered. Each approach to the communion 
table pledges every member to this. The case then would 
seem to stand thus : All the members of visible Churches 
are trustees^ to whom it is committed of God to see that 
vahd baptism is upheld and urged in His name, and ad- 
ministered to the right characters, and in proper form. A 
conscientious trustee finds that through mistake and care- 
lessness those with whom he had been accustomed to act 
have not properly qualified themselves for this duty, and 
have been in the habit of voting to administei" it to unquali- 
fied persons, and in a manner quite unauthorized by the 
trust. He is so satisfied of this that he has anew qualified 
himself to act in the appointed form. But others remain 
as ignorant on this subject as he was, and by this means are 
perjDctuating the error and all its evil consequences. There 
are, however, other bodies of trustees, who, having beconie 
duly qualified, rightly administer the trust, and thus correct 
the mistakes of their erroneous brethren. The question is, 
with which of these bodies shall he act in future as a thor- 
oughly consistent Christian man ? 

But the subject of this volume will, it is hoped, afford 
some matter of useful meditation to Baptists • and it lias 
been for their sakes chiefly that it has been written. We 



374 THE USEFUL EAKNESTNESS 

ought to mark tlie faitlifalness of tlie Great Head of the 
Church to those who act, relymgiy upon His word without 
looimig to consequences. The fathers of the Baptist de- 
nommation in this country a hundred years ago, w^ere men 
of this stamp ; men of great firmness and independence of 
character ; men who walked alone with God, and could, 
therefore, endure to stand alone before men. There were 
among them, here and there, those of cultivated mind and 
of some repute for learning, and attainments in the denomi- 
nations they left. But as a body they were all men who 
loved righteousness — men of great endurance for the 
truth's sake. If at any time since the baj^tisms of the day 
of Pentecost there were a body of persons who, from j)ure 
and simple love of truth, and at the cost of every thing 
most dear to men, came out from the world and sometimes 
from other denominations, to form new and ^uve churches, 
they w^ere the early Baptists of this country. Noble in- 
deed were the Pilgrim Fathers of Massachusetts in all 
these respects, but they made one mistake. They were 
afraid to trust the truth to stand alone. They wanted to 
coerce men to make them good, and to get children com- 
mitted by vows before they could understand, lest they 
should not be willing to commit themselves afterward. 
Such, indeed, has ever been the history of infant baptism, 
and they simply retained an error which had origmated 
ages before, and which they rendered less harmful than 
any of their predecessors. But they had many prejudices 
not easily rooted out. 

The Baptists, on the ' other hand were more completely 
formed upon abstract New Testament principles from 
Roger Williams downward. To the superficial they may 
have seemed too fond of an abstract correctness with too 



OF THE EASLY BAPTISTS. 375 

little regard to what was practical. It is on this point that 
we have been anxious to yindicate their memory. For the 
first hmidred years of their existence in this comitry they 
stood very much alone, insulted, fined, imprisoned, and de- 
spised. In Massachusetts this v>^as the case up to the Vf ar 
of Independence. They were yet more unjustly and cruelly 
persecuted in Virginia for simply " preaching the Gospel 
of the Son of God." Few of them had education, and not 
many wealth. They were looked upon by all others with 
a hatred it is now difiicult to conceive. They needed, and 
God gave to them, intrepidity of character to endure and 
to suffer without retaliation on the one hand, or flinching 
on the other. They were not reeds shaken by the wind ; 
and in raiment they approached him who wore the garment 
of camels' hair more closely far than those clad in soft rai- 
ment, and who feed delicately. They were men deeply 
impressed with the importance of the peculiar principles 
upon which they had planted themselves — principles un- 
folded in the former pages of this work ; and they reiter- 
ated them again and again, not separately, but as an a^ggre- 
gate — not in the form of dissected limbs of truth, but as 
one living body, clothed with flesh, and into which God 
breathed the breath of heavenly life. These truths lay in 
their mind as a simple whole, no part of which could be 
touched and abstracted without some injury to the rest. 
This was the essence of their Church system, this the life 
of their cause. The simplicity, the consistency, and the 
intimate connection of every part with the whole, they 
deeply felt. That scheme was the same that the Saviour 
had embodied eighteen hundred years before in the Divine 
and living organization of His Church system. Tliese men 
felt its power and, therefore, they spoke. They had a bolder 



376 THE GREAT DANGER 

way of instructing theii' churches in those truths of which 
baptism is the symbol, than is now common. They brought 
it into the foreground as the New Testament unquestion- 
ably does, and gave it a cons]Dicuousness as the most eloquent 
preacher of all those fundamental truths T\ith which it was 
associated in their minds. It was this boldness, this un- 
questionable ScrijDturalness of their statements which gave 
Baptists all their power and success. Itwas not theb argu- 
ments but their declarations that succeeded. Their views 
on baptism do not require much reasoning to prove them 
true, for they are quite obvious. The burden of proof hes 
on the other side to show that somethmg else may possi- 
bly be true also. It is not by critical discussions on the 
word SaTTTl'Coj^ however appropriate in their j^lace, perhaps, 
that this controversy is gomg to be settled or exhibited in its 
true light, but rather by keeping aU the principles of which 
baptism is the symbol connected together as a consistent 
whole, just as they are combined in the ISTew Testament. 
And it has been admitted and proved by the ablest organ of 
Presbyterianism ^ that infant baptism is utterly at war with 
the whole Scrij^ture rej^resentation of this ordinance. 

There is not the shghtest fear of any Baptists ever com- 
ing to disbelieve hi the great distinctive features of their 
denominational sentiments. But there is a danger at the 
l^resent day of quite a different character, ^. 6., that they 
should begin to believe them so plain and clear, as not to be 
worth maintaining — as sure to make their way without any 
advocacy. 

It is painful to differ from other Christians, and hence the 
whole subject is often forcedly kept out of sight. Then it 
is soon urged that baptism is non-essential, and this is reit- 
i The "North British Review," August, 1852, Art. 3. 



OF BAPTISTS. 377 

erated with an emphasis which shows that a great deal more 
is meant by it than the very common-place and universally 
beheved truth which the words properly affirm, i. e., that 
persons may be saved mthout baj)tism. But thus, singularly 
enough, it happens that the very assertion most opposed to 
the saving efficacy of water baptism, becomes the main ar- 
gument for not disturbing the corruption of that ordinance 
which most essentially teaches it. This sentiment generally 
means m the mouth of those who use it, that '' laptism is a 
matter of no importance:^ This once admitted. Baptist 
principles may one after another be rapidly ignored, even 
where the truth of them is never questioned. 

Without a strong regard to their history and the prin- 
ciples of their ancestors, a denomination may quite lose sight 
of those distinctive peculiarities which have been the source 
of its usefulness to the Church and to the world. 

When a person has been brought up a conscientious and 
thorough Pedobaptist, and in after life embraces Baptist 
principles, he generally feels very vividly the importance of 
the discovery he has made, and the clear and firm Biblical 
character which true baptism has imparted to the whole 
system of his belief and practice. Hence he generally 
becomes a strong and earnest advocate of these sentiments, 
from a conviction of their importance. 

But in Baptist families, among young people brought up 
in these principles, the feeling is often very diffisrent. 
Without doubting generally the truth^ they find it difficult 
to realize the importance to tlie world and to the Cliurch, 
of views which to them seem so simple as to be quite trite 
and common-place. 

Few children of Baptist parents have perhaps grown up 
without a difficulty of this kind. They see pious and ex- 



378 THIO VALUE OF 

cellent Pedobaptists, ^^hom they respect and love, and love as 
Christians, and they ask what is there after all so important in 
Baptist principles? Here are PedobajDtist ministers and 
m.embers, who, except that they hold some exploded and 
nnintelhgible notions of infant Church membership, and 
practice spiinkling, are as good, and as pious, and as wise, as 
any Christians hving. 

It takes (we sj^eak from observation), some time, some 
experience, and some study of the natural development of 
principles mto practices, to know truly how to estimate the 
importance of any abstract truth, and many persons, for 
want of this, suppose that Baptists attach too much import- 
ance to their own vieY>"s, and are prepossessed in favor of 
them, merely because their lathers were, and not because 
there is any thmg in their nature that renders them im- 
portant. 

This work has been written to meet that conscientious 
laxity of ^dews which arises, not from too great a love of 
other Christians, but from ignorance of the importance of 
Baptist prmciples to the evangelical history of the last cen- 
tury, and to the success of many of those movements 
which are the greatest glory of the present age. 

When an agricultural chemist by minute analysis, has 
satisfied hhnself that a particular soil contams two or three 
thousand parts too much of the protoxide of ii'on, though 
the soil may appear excellent, though wheat may grow in 
it tall and heavy, yet he knows from his analysis that the 
wheat will be liable to rust. And so as he analyzes vari- 
ous soils, he can tell, from difterences that escape all, but 
the most minute tests, that one soil ^oll most product- 
ively }^eld wheat, and another beans, and another clover. 
The real importance of the study of Church history rests 



ANALYZING PEINCIPLES. 379 

on the same basis. It enables us to estimate the value 
to the world and to the Church, of certain principles, to 
analyze them by the tests of the Gospel, to weigh them 
in the balances of the sanctuary, and thus to ascertain be- 
forehand, their ultimate effects. 

The superficial farmer might esteem it a matter of but 
little consequence to know if his soil had a thousand parts 
more or less of gypsum, or the salts of sulphuric acid. But 
the more enlightened man would regulate his purchase and 
his expectations upon just such facts as these. So to persons 
miaccustomed to analyze and estimate the value of prin- 
ciples in history, those of the Baptists may seem of little 
importance. But to such as look further, we are per- 
suaded they will appear in a very different light. Even on 
the scale of a century, facts of the deepest significance and 
importance to all who love evangelical truth, are connected 
with these principles. 

Doubtless in nature, very many of the most important 
phosphates in the soil, and which weighed separately in 
the scale of the apothecary would seem pitifully light and 
commercially valueless, may, as chemical ingredients stimu- 
lating the life of every seed, increase the price of land a 
hundredfold. Or the same amount of rusty iron, which as 
metal would not be worth a cent, duly mixed up in the soil, 
may, by means of its very oxidation, give its most import- 
ant productive qualities to the land. It is thus, too, with 
principles in the constitution of a Church. By theological 
analysis we may define, by our systems demonstrate them 
in few words, but in order for them to liave then- appropri- 
ate and vitalizing power upon the Church and upon the 
world, it is not enough that they be accurately stated and 
logically proved, but that they should occupy just that size 



380 MUTUAL APPEOACHES OF 

and shape, that proj^ortion and position in the Christian life 
and Chiu'ch hfe, Trhich Christ and His Apostles originally 
gave them. 

Many things contribute to produce lax views of these dis- 
tinctive pecuharities. There is tar less actual difference be- 
tween the Baptists and many other denominations than there 
Avas a century back. The Presbyterians are now as a body 
all evangehcal, and nowhere are the doctrines of grace more 
faithfally preached than among them. The separation of 
the orthodox Congregationahsts from the Unitarians has 
brought the former of these bodies to the same happy po- 
sition, with a greater correctness and freedom in thefr sys- 
tem of Chmx'h .government. The Methodists, now com- 
pletely distinct fi'om the Episcopal Chm*ch, preach the 
doctrines of the new birth with the greatest earnestness 
and success, while what is left of the evangelical portion 
of the Episcopal Church has become more zealously anti- 
sacramental fi'om then* opposition to Puseyism. These have 
all drawn much nearer to the Baptists than formerly. They 
have, too, in most cases, quite altered thefr tone, Xow 
they are generally charitable, brotherly and kind. Some 
of them have made the most Christian concessions as to the 
truth of these princijDles, and done amj^le justice to the exer- 
tions of the Baptists. In other histances, and very ex- 
tensively, without any controversy, they have given u]) the 
preaching and the practice of in£mt baptism. Indeed their 
chief plea now is that baptism is a non-essential and there- 
fore they sup230se an tmimpoitant matter. 

The Baptists have also api^roached other denominations 
m some respects. All have greatly advanced in the com- 
forts and refinements of life during this last century. In 
the education of their ministers, in the coinmodiousness, 



BAPTISTS A]S"D P E D O B A P T I S T S. 381 

style and decorations of tlieir houses of worship, there has 
been a general assimilation of Baptists with other denomi- 
nations, to such a. degree that in any of our cities and 
towns a person might attend most of the different congre- 
gations for years and so far as these things go, not he able 
to conjecture with what denomination he was worshiping. 

And might we not go further and add that there is so 
very little that is distinguishing in the character of the ser- 
mons themselves, and of the whole worship, and impression 
left, that unless a person should attend upon some baptismal 
occasion, he might be present for months and years without 
being able to discover any of our denominational principles. 
This would not have been the case a hundred years ago. 

The causes of this difference are worth notice. Our 
young ministers study theology as a science after the Col- 
lege course, and because in that time Baptism as a distinct 
point may properly occupy but a lecture or two of their 
systematic theology, they, on entering the pulpit, pursue a 
proportionable distribution in their sermons, and empty out 
a course of systematic lectures in which each part of divine 
truth is separately discussed, and dissected with clerical 
nicety, but nothing more. This is a grave mistake, not at all 
necessarily arising from theological education, which should 
indeed rather correct it. It is just as erroneous as for a 
surgeon, when sent for to cure a wound, forgetting the dis- 
tinction between living organism and dead matter, to dis- 
sect the limb instead of applying a balm. Let the student 
analyze closely in the dissectiiig-room^ but let the physician 
of souls never forget that he is sent of God to deal with 
living men, to bhid up their wounded spirits, to establish or 
to feed the Church, the body of Christ. It is not by nnaly- 
sisbut by synthesis^ not by dissection but by nutrition, that 



382 EXCHANGE OF POSITION 

this is to be clone. There is too much of mere dry dis- 
cussion, and too Httle of the freedom of Bibhcal preaching 
and exposition, too httle of the simjDhcity and straight- 
forwardness of the Gospel, too httle heart hi aU preaching 
at the present day. 

It is well to consider how completely Churches, like in- 
dividuals, are altered by becoining imitators of the points 
of usefulness belongmg to others, histead of develoj)mg in 
a natural manner the ideas arising out of their own princi- 
ples and cu'cumstances. 

A few years ago, especially in England, the Episcopal 
Church was noted for a want of flexibility in all its minis- 
trations. Xot only its prayers were previously prepared, 
but its sermons and its reo-ulations were all Q-one throuo-h 
^ith so much formahty, and so httle adaptation to the 
various wants of the congregation, as to drive from the es- 
tabhshment many fomilies who wished to enjoy an earnest 
and practical piety. The Dissenters meanwhile were poor 
and far inferior in education, wealth and all external attrac- 
tions. But they were zealous, earnest men, who sought to 
do the people good. Their preaching was for the most part 
extemporaneous, it applied the Bible closely to the wants 
of their hearers, and had httle that was dry and dogmatic. 
It came from the heart and it went to the heart. There 
might be no choir or organ in tlie gallery, but the tune was 
sure to be such that the whole congregation could join. In 
this way they won upon the masses, who saw among them 
the signs of a limng piety, and half the people became Dis- 
senters, supporting the rehgion of the State, and their own 
besides. But now all this is much changed. The Dissent- 
ers have become wealthy, their church accommodations 
have improved, scientific singing has greatly superseded 



IX E]S'GLA]SrD. 383 

that of the congregation, and scientific essays have too much 
taken the place of earnest preaching. They have become 
ahnost as stiff and inflexible as the Episcopalians used to be. 

Meamvhile, among the more j)ious clergy of the English 
Establishment there has arisen a spirit of new life. Seeing 
that they were losing their congregations, they sought and 
they found out the cause. Many of the bishops exhort 
their clergy to abandon the habit of reading their dis- 
courses, and to preach extemporaneously. They cultivate 
congregational singing, and persuade the whole audience 
to utter the responses. They study to make their visits, 
their preaching, and their labors tell upon the masses, and 
have come round wisely to the greatest possible simplicity 
and earnestness in their duties. The result i^that they are 
at this moment rapidly gaining again u]Don the common 
people, who, to their surprise, find an earnestness and life in 
the Established preachers Vv^hich the Dissenters seem to 
have lost in anti-Corn-Law leagues, and political excite- 
ments. A minister of the Church of England, on visiting 
this coimtry not long ago, expressed himself with surprise 
that in so young and free a country the religious services 
should be so artificial ; the choir-singing so artistic that 
few could enjoy it, and the preaching so studied and in- 
tellectual that few could follow it ; but void of warmth, 
unction, and popular adaptedness. 

In all this, so far as we are chargeable as a denomination, 
it has originated in imitating others. And as imitations 
are never natural, and generally extreme and exaggerated, 
so has it proved here. That it may have been a necessary 
step in our intellectual progress as a denomination, we 
would not deny ; that it will enable us hereafter to en- 
graft a more comprehensive adaptedness to various condi- 



384 THE FUTURE. 

tions of the world and of the Church, is probable. It will 
certainly allow a greater range and variety, according to 
the gifts both of speakers and of hearers, and form the 
basis of a more extended culture and nniversal usefulness. 
But it is not less true that all this is but the mark of sec- 
ond-rate culture, even intellectually. As we advance fur- 
ther we shall no doubt come round again to a greater love 
of simplicity in all our ministratiens. 

Then heUever''s bcqjtls77i^ both in preaching and in prac- 
tice, will occupy a more natural promnience in the minis- 
trations of tlie sanctuary, and the Spirit of God again in 
redeeming love, as originally at creation, be found moving 
" upon the fice of the waters." 

When, as baptists, we have better studied our own 
principles, and learned wherein onr true strength lieth, even 
in simplicity and sincerity, then will self-respect and humility 
be always combined by ns ; an earnest desire for the appro- 
bation of God, and less care for that of man. 

Then all the varied experiences of God's grace will be 
wisely appropriated, and contribute to our future progress. 
Then shall we elevate large masses of the community, rising 
steadily with them higher and higher in intelligence and in 
vn-tue. For while a rehgion too exclusively intellectual in 
its sympathies renders the soul cold and sterile, that of 
earnest spiritual life will impart a genial warmth to the com- 
munity and to each member, in intellect, heart, and life ; 
"that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished 
to every good work." 



I 



APPENDIX. 



17 



APPENDICES. 



APPENDIX A. Page 133. 

STATISTICS SHOWING THE DECLI:N'E OF i:NrFAKT BAPTISM. 

The following tables are compiled from the reports of the Gen- 
eral Assembly, and sufficient for my present purpose. I found it 
impossible to obtain a complete set of these except in the later 
years, but the calculations were made with the most extensive 
tables before me now probably to be found. 



Date. 



Presbyterian Church (0. S.) 

1827 

1828 

1829 

1832 

1833 

1836 

1837 

18H8 

1839 

1853 

1854 

Presbyterian Church (N. S.) 

1838 

1853 

Reformed Dutch Church. 
1853 





ed on 
mina- 
on. 






o " 


3 c^-rt 


a^ 




O 


<^H 


"^w 


W 


135,285 


12,938 


10,229 


2,965 


146,308 


15,095 


10,790 


3,389 


162,816 


14,846 


12,171 


3,982 


217,348 


34,160 


13,246 


9,650 


233,580 


23,546 


14,035 


6,950 


219,126 


11,512 


11,089 


2,729 


220,557 


11,580 


11,697 


3,031 


177,665 


9,562 


10,164 


2,692 


128,043 


6,377 


7,712 


1,644 


219,263 


11,846 


11,644 


2,942 


225,404 


13,433 


12,041 


3,597 


100,850 


4,691 


4,426 


1,630 


140,452 


6,174 


4,032 


1,715 


36,597 


1,759 


2,394 


350 



13,194 
14,179 
16,153 

22.896 
2i;820 
13,818 
14,728 
12,856 
9,856 
14,586 
15,638 



0,050 
5,747 



2,744 



388 ''the way of life." 

APPENDIX B. Page 137. 

"the ay ay of life" baptist i:n" theoky. 

If from the statistics of the Presbyterians we turn to their lit- 
erature, what Baptist can look at such a work as '' The Way of 
Life," by Professor Hodge of Princeton, published by the Ameri- 
can Sunday-school Union, without surprise and pleasure. In chap- 
ter eight, particularly, Baptist views are taught most clearly. The 
following abstract has been put into my hands by a friend. It was 
published some time since in the " Christian Reflector." 

The doctrine " that professed believers only are qualified sub- 
jects for baptism" has never been more distinctly stated than in 
this work. The positions " that baptism involves a public profes- 
sion of the Gospel," and, " that the sacraments are signs and seals 
of spiritual blessings, and consequently utterly useless without 
faith on the part of the recipient," are repeatedly enforced and 
illustrated. The whole spirit and tenor of the chapter on '^ the 
Profession of Religion," harmonizes with the strong language which 
we shall proceed to quote. The first sentence in section two, 
reads : ^' That baptism and the Lord's Supper, whatever other im- 
portant ends they may be intended to serve, were appointed as a 
mode of publicly professing our faith in the Gospel, is clearly 
taught in the Bible." Again, "When Christ commanded the 
Apostles to make disciples, baptizing them, etc., he obviously in- 
tended that baptism should be a badge of disci pleship, or that by 
that rite his followers should acknowledge their relation to him." 
Again, " The Scriptures require those who are admitted to these 
ordinances to make a profession of their faith and repentance." 
To sustain this assertion he refers to the baptism of the converts 
on the day of Pentecost, of the eunuch, of Cornelius, and of Paul, 
with this concluding remark. "Paul was a penitent believer be- 
fore his baptism, and thus in all other cases when men were bap- 
tized, they professed to be Christians." " Baptism implies faith. 



"the way of LiFi:." 389 

If this faith be wanting, baptism can do ns no more good than a 
heartless confession." In a subsequent part of the chapter he de- 
fends at lengtli the position that knowledge and piety are neces- 
sary qualifications for baptism, or, in his own words, "essential to 
a proper attendance on the sacraments." 

After proving from Scripture his second principal doctrine, that 
"the sacraments are signs and seals of spiritual blessings," he con- 
cludes, "If, however, the sacraments are seals on the part of God, 
the reception of them implies a voluntary engagement on the part 
of the Christian, to devote himself to the service of Christ." " To 
be baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, im- 
plies a voluntary dedication of ourselves to God as our Father, Ee- 
deemer, and Sanctifier." He compares baptism to the oath by 
which a soldier consecrates himself to military service ; again to a 
deed ; to the marriage ceremony, and the ceremony of inaugura- 
tion, all implying the voluntary action of the parties interested. 

In answering the important question, what good do these ordi- 
nances accomplish, he describes beautifully the invigorating, reno- 
vating power which baptism possesses " when the Christian, in 
the exercise of faith, sees in the water of baptism the lively em- 
blem of the purifying inflaence of the blood and spirit of Christ." 
"The Scriptures teach that the sacraments are thus efficacious, not 
to every recipient, but to the beUever," and " to neither rite is any 
value ascribed apart from the spiritual change which they are ap- 
pointed to represent." The same sentiments are repeated in a 
variety of expressions which it is unnecessary to quote, as each one 
can read the work and thus verify our declaration thai it advo- 
cates Baptist views. N'ot a single qualifying remark is introduced 
to break the force of the statements above quoted, but on the con- 
trary the Professor closes every avenue of escape by saying, 
"When in human governments the laws prescribe a particular 
mode in which we are to acknowledge allegiance to our country, 
it is not competent for us to neglect that mode, nor have wo a 
right to adopt a diflferent method of acknowledgment, or to suffer 
our allegiance to be inferred from our conduct. And if Christ has 



390 THE DATIYE 

prescribed a particular way in which He will be acknowledged by 
his followers, intelligently and willfully to refuse obedience to His 
command is to renounce our allegiance to Him, and to forfeit the 
benefits of His kingdom." 



APPEI^DIX C. Page 158. 

ON THE DATIYE AXD THE PREPOSITIONS USED IN 
CONNECTION WITH Banji^co, 

I^OTWITHSTAXDING the concessions of Professor Eobinson, in his 
lexicon (last edition), many still appear disposed to hold on to Pro- 
fessor Stuart's view, and strongly aflSrm that in all these cases, 
even where the preposition £v occurs, '^ the manner of the action 
is no farther designated than the word jSairri^D implies it." ^ Let 
us therefore more closely examine the rule which Professor Stuart 
attempts to lay down, and by which he would justify so singular 
an assertion in connection with his own admissions. Those who 
do this will never be disposed to adopt such a statement. 

"When the genitive or dative is used after the verb, either with 
or without a preposition, it does not designate the manner of the 
baptism, but only the kind of element by which this baptism was 
effected. And further still, the connection shows that the prepo- 
sition, and in fine the whole construction, is no more decisive than 
the verb alone." 

But is this true ? He says " it results from the nature of the 
genitive and dative cases, and the prepositions with which they are 
connected in all the constructions now in question. To this," he 
continues, " I make the appeal, and those who know enough of the 
laws of syntax and idiom in Greek to be qualified to judge, will be 
able to determine for themselves," etc.'^ 

InTow to this we too make the appeal, both because it can be 
clearly shown that Professor Stuart has fallen into a serious error, 

1 Biblical Repos., p. Sit. 2 Ibid. 



AND BanTit^b), 391 

and still more because of the enormous and dangerous superstruct- 
ure erected on this sandy basis. It is from this, for instance, he 
sweepingly infers that (setting aside Mark, i. 9), ''we may say in all 
other cases in the New Testament, the mode of baptism is left un- 
determined by the original Greek, so far as the language itself is 
concerned, unless it is necessarily implied by the word (ianrll^D ; for 
in all other cases, only the element by which, not the mode in 
which baptism is performed, is designated by the sacred writers." ^ 

We shall perhaps see, before we close, that the word jSaTTTi^Q 
necessarily implies immersion. But we now only contend that this 
is its primary and usual signfication, so that there is always a 
probability of such being the case, until an exception is shown. 
All this Professor Stuart cheerfully concedes; but it being granted, 
it is quite a serious grammatical blunder to state that in "all cases" 
the dative, even the dative and the preposition iv together, leave 
the mode as undetermined as they found it ; that they " no fur- 
ther designate the manner of the action" than the verb iSairTl^cj 
alone. On the contrary, as Campbell has shown, the whole to- 
gether make up a construction that renders the meaning of the 
verb irresistible, being such a " phraseology" as is never used where 
sprinkling oiy)ouring alone are indicated.^ 

The dative is, as Klihner remarks in his Grammar, " the where- 
case," and hence designates as a local object " the place in (by, 
near, at) which an action occurs." Usually in prose a preposition 
is added so as to designate the sense more precisely. Where it is 
not, however, the above is the exact force of the dative alone. ^ 
In this case the natural signification of the verb must indicate 
which of these senses the dative has. And it is sometimes capable 
of doing this very precisely. 

Besides the idea of the "^7i<??T," that of " a;?j[>roac7i," lies at the 
basis of this case, asButtman has shown, and further, the dative will 
not only take you to the place, but also point out to you the in- 
strument with or ly which the action of the verb is accomplished, 

^ Page Sit. "^ Notes on Matthew, iii. 11. 

3 § 282 (3), and 283 A. 



392 THE DATIVE AXD B u tt i i ;to . 

and beyond all this it will indicate to you, sometimes very dis- 
tinctly, the manner in wliicli the instrument is applied. It will 
point out that an action occurred not only ly these means, but in 
this manner/ What is very singular is, that while Professor 
Stuart seems inclined to deny from the nature of the dative that 
it can here indicate manner^ he says in his Grammar that it is in 
its nature to do this very thing : " The manner in which any thing 
is done is designated by the dative."^ Such, then, is the power 
of the dative alone^ without the assistance of any preposition to 
make it more exact. As an illustration of this precision of power, 
in connection with just these verbs, ^a-rl^G) and /3a-7cj, what can 
be more complete than that quoted and translated by Professor 
Stuart, himself, from Aristophanes Eccles. : " They dip the wool in 
warm water (depuu).^^ Here we have exactly the construction in 
question, a dative without any preposition expressing the manner 
of the action mentioned in the verb, quite as clearly as if we 
should translate Acts, xi. 16, " John baptized in water'' — a precisely 
similar construction. 

Perhaps Professor Stuart would say that it is not the dative ly 
itself^ but the verb that designates the manner, in the case from 
Aristophanes. It amounts to the same thing. Th6||^rb followed 
by the simple dative forms a construction, then, that may decisively 
express the manner. Whether it does so in the Xew Testament, 
we shall see presently. But Professor Stuart's rule, that the da- 
tive " in all snch cases," only designates " the kind of element,'' 
and " nothing further ^'^^ is clearly an error, and a very serious one 
to make in such a case as this, and upon which to build such an 
enormous inference. 

But if, in a case like this, the simple dative may clearly indicate 
manner, how much more with the preposition ev, and the following 
verbs like tSaTrro or jSaTrri^G). 

" The fundamental meaning of the prepositions appears in the 
clearest manner in indicating the relations of space^'''' ^ and we turn 

^ See Buttman, § 133, 1, 3, 1 (2), Kiihner, § 285, chap. i. (3) {d). 
^ New Testament Granimar, § 106, 3. ^ Kiihiier, 286-9. 



FOECE OF THE PREPOSITIONS. 393 

now more specifically to Matthew, iii. 6, because here such a rela- 
tion unquestionably is found. iTow tlie primary idea of kv is that 
of being encircled, surrounded, enclosed in, or within a given 
space. Liddell and Scott, following the great Passow, give as its 
radical signification " a being or remaining ivithin.^^ As compared 
with etc and e/c, it stands between the two, e/r implying motion 
into, and eic motion out of. This Eobinson also shows. In the 
first eight chapters of Matthew, ev is in our English version trans- 
lated " in," or '' within," sixty-one times, " at," once^ and '' with," or 
"wherewith," five times. This last includes Matthew, iii. 11, 
where it is twice wrongly rendered '' with," as we shall see. 
Throughout the whole of the ISTew Testament, in which it occurs 
nearly two thousand six hundred times, it is rendered " with" 
one hundred and twenty-nine times, or less than one time in 
twenty, and in the greater number of these cases, the distinctive 
sense of " in," or '' within," can be most clearly traced. 

Can it then be said with any approach to correctness, that when 
such a preposition is used as in Matt. iii. 6, after a verb which it is 
admitted naturally, if not necessarily signifies' ' to dip^'^^ and before 
the name of a river, that " the manner of the action is no further 
designated ? We have the primary meaning of the preposition in 
just that relation in which its signification is always the clearest 
(i. 6., as to space or place) put in on purpose to certify to us that 
the natural meaning of the verb is intended here. "When Aris- 
totle says, " And dipping it {h oivcS) in wine they drink it," Pi'o- 
fessor Stuart feels the force of the preposition and acknowledges 
the necessity of just this translation.^ So in 2 Kings, v. 14, the 
Sept. reads as Professor S. renders it : "- Naaman went down and 
plunged himself seven times into the Jordan." Here, too, we 
have the same verb (SairTi^cj^ and the same preposition h ; — in fact 
precisely the same kind of construction as Matt. iii. G. Professor 
Robinson considers that the preposition ^v renders the sense in 
Matthew, iii. 6 as unequivocal as our Englisli " in'' makes it.'' He 
calls this ''an adjunct of manner;'' while Professor Stuart declares 

' Pago 316. '^ Lexicon, jSairrL^cj, 2 a. ^. 

17# 



394 FORCE OF 

that in this and all cases of a similar construction *' tlie manner of 
the action is no furtlier designated than the word ISaTrrl^G) im- 
phes it." 1 It is difficult to understand how Professor Stuart could 
have deliberately penned such a sentence. It is true that the 
sense of all prepositions is greatly to be ascertained by their cor- 
respondence with the meaning of the verb. But it were a mis- 
take at variance with every principle of language to suppose that 
they are capable of adding nothing to its force and clearness. This 
is, in fact, just what they are for. Here the usual sense of the 
preposition corroborates beyond all cavil the usual sense of the 
verb. It is more indicative of immersion than any that could have 
been employed (unless el^ should be thought an exception) ; a prep- 
osition which is never used with verbs signifying to sprinkle, but yet 
is most commonly put in connection with the rite of baptism. It 
is clearly the duty of every translator, tlien, to render the prepo- 
sition as King James' version has done, " m" the Jordan, both in 
Matt. iii. 6, and the parallel passage, Mark, i. 5. Indeed, all t ans- 
lations agree in this. The fact before alluded to, that Jesus was 
confessedly baptized at the same time and place, and by the same 
person, in this river, makes the whole about as irresistible to the 
interpreter of the language of Scripture as any thing could make 
it; and this not in regard to one or two cases, but literally thou- 
sands of instances, for " There went out unto him Jerusalem and 
all Judea^ and all the region round alout Jordan^ and were bap- 
tized of him ill Jordan," h rCi 'lopddvrjj^ 

It is, therefore, an error involving many thousands of instances, 
as shown by Campbell and Professor Eobinson, for Professor Stu- 
art to assert that "in all other cases except Mark, i. 9, the mode 
of Baptism is left undetermined unless it is necessarily implied by 
tlie word /3a7rr/C^."3 

But there are other passages where the same preposition ev also 
occurs, though differently translated by our common version ; as 
Matt. iii. 11.* I, indeed, baptize yon with (ev) water." But here 

1 Page 317. 2 Matt. iu. 6. 3 Page 317. 

* See also, Mark i. 8, John, i. 26, 31, 33. 



THE DATIVE. 395 

the Douay version and several others translate correctly, "I 
indeed baptize you in water." So does the able critic Dr. Camp- 
bell. Professor Eobinson gives the sense "i/z water" in all these 
cases in his Lexicon. 

But now in three instances, all relating to John's baptism, and 
precisely parallel in sense to the cases in Matthew and Mark 
above, rendered " in water,'* Luke, after the verb, inserts the sim- 
j)le dative vdan in Luke, iii. 16, Acts, i. 5 and xi. 16. This is a 
usage peculiar, in the ISTew Testament, to this writer. It is not, 
however, uncommon to good classic authors. Professor Stuart has 
cited a similar instance from Aristophanes, as we have seen. But 
does he render it "They dip the wool ^'- luith warm water" OepfxC)'^. 
Certainly not, but *'m warm water." 

Professor Robinson, though translating the parallel passage ^ 
" i?2," would render Luke, iii. 16, and the similar cases, "•with 
water." 2 He seems to have forgotten that what he terms the da- 
tive of instrument may also specify the manner.^ Dr. E. Avould 
probably defend his mode of renderiog, on tlie ground that '' lie 
as a translator^ should not be blamed for not expressing definitely 
in a translation what is indefinite in the original." ^ But he thus 
erroneously supposes that the verb is naturally quite indefinite as 
to mode. Chiefly, however, is he in error because in rendering 
the preposition " icitli''' he excludes the natural and most probable 
sense of the verb, and under the plea of iudefiniteness, denies as 
definitely as possible that to be its meaning which in a parallel pass- 
age he has adopted, for we never speak of " immersing ^ci^/t water." 

If Professor Robinson were right in this last case, it would 
clearly make it the duty of the interpreter of Scripture to erase or 
contradict the work of the translator; since if Luke, iii. 16 is 
doubtful. Matt. iii. 11 being clear, it would be the duty of the in- 
terpreter to harmonize the two by making the passage in Luke 
conform to that in Matthew, and regarding the sense as in both 
cases clearly " in water." 

^ Matt. iii. 11. ^ See Lcxicou jSanTtCG), 2 a. /^. 

Kiihner, § 285, 3. d. * Stuart's Ernesti's Appendix ou Translation. 



396 EOMANS, VI. 4, 

Here, plainly, Luke, iii. 16, is the precise parallel in sense, abbre- 
viated only in form from Matt, iii 11, but so alike as to imply a 
common origin. Hence, by the rule of tlie obvious passage clear- 
ing up the doubtful one, must we consider this as a case in Avhich 
the preposition is to be understood^ and as omitted only by an ellip- 
sis which has no right to be considered any ambiguity at all, but 
as an idiom common to Luke, to be conveyed, like all other idioms, 
in clear and suitable terms in translation/ This Campbell has 
done in his version of Luke, iii. 16. 

In fact, looking at the meaning of this command, merely from 
the expressions in themselves considered, not only is the ^' prob- 
ability in favor of immersion," as Professor Stuart admits, but the 
sense in every case is obvious and certain, by only letting the more 
fully expressed passages explain the elliptical, instead of attempt- 
ing, as he inconsiderately does, to throw doubts upon the sense of 
the clearest imaginable cases by those less fully stated.''' 

However, it is sufficient here to bear in mind this one fact ; that 
whatever is the probable meaning of the words of a command, 
that and thai alone is the command. 



APPENDIX D. Page 169. 

ON ROMANS, VI. 4, AISD COLOSSIANS, II. 12. 

Professor Stuart maintains that in Kom. vi. 4, the phrase 
"buried with him by baptism" does not refer to the mode of " lit- 
eral baptism" at all, but that an internal moral burial to sin alone 
is intended. His views are to be found in his Commentary on the 
Epistle to the Romans, and in the BibHcal Repository, April, 1833, 
particularly thi^ last. He argues as follows : ^ {a.) " There is here 
an antithesis," i. e.^ a lurial on the one hand, and a resurrection on 
the other, and that as the resurrection is clearly spiritual, the burial 

* Campbell's Rhetoric, Book ii. eh. vi. sec. 1, part i. 
^ See p. 315. 3 Page 328. 



AND COLOSSIAI^S, II. 12. 397 

must be also. But whoever marks closely this verse, will jBnd that 
the whole figure is carried out with more than usual precision. 
The antithesis to the spiritual resurrection is the spiritual death to 
sin (verse 3.), after wliich we are turied by baptism, and so the an- 
tithesis to the burial is, strictly speaking, not our resurrection, of 
which there is no mention in verse 4, but " the walk in newness of 
life," which takes place correspondingly afterward in both cases. 

(b) But Professor Stuart argues that "nothing can be plainer 
than that the expression we are 'buried with Christ, Romans, vi. 
4, is equivalent in sense to we are dead with him, verse 8." ^ It is 
rather suspicious for an argument when he who adduces it has to 
begin by saying that it is so ^cery plain. To us the opposite is very 
plain. A burial always embraces the idea of death, hut also some- 
thing more. Or rather it is the symbol, pro^/, and public acknowl- 
edgment of a death, not the death itself. So baptism is not the 
death, it is the symbol (verse 5), and the public acknowledgment 
or attestation of the death. And throughout these verses, the 
death is spiritual, but the burial in water is physical, attesting it. 

(c.) The last argument of Professor Stuart is, that he does "not 
think immersion a very natural symbol of burial," and finds it no- 
wliere else in Scripture. Most persons find it a very striking sym- 
bol, but on this point each reader can judge for himself. It is used 
here, and Col. ii. 12. To us it seems impossible to conceive of the 
figure of burial twice, thus used in reference to baptism without 
an allusion to the most obvious sense of the word itself. Why 
else was it introduced at all ? 

It may here be added that Professor Stuart runs the parallel 
between this passage in Romans, and Oolossians, ii. 12, all the way 
through, apparently attempting to explain the one passage by the 
other. We say apparently, for the real argument leads exactly the 
other way, amounting in fact to this : Colossians, ii. 12, is obscure, 
Romans, vi. 4, is somewhat parallel, therefore wo must encumber 
the passage in the Romans, with the difliculties and obscurities of 
that in Colossians. 

» Pago 329. 



398 COLOSSIAXS, II. 12. 

This is exactly what we have to complain of all the way through 
Professor Stnart's discnssion of this question, that instead of fol- 
lowing the established rule, and interpreting the difficult passage 
by the clear one, aU is reversed, and doubts are cast upon the 
plainest passages, because some others may be less palpable. 

And yet Colossians, ii. 12, is obvious enough, even by itself. 
" Buried with him (ev) baptism ; wherein also ye are risen with 
Him, through faith of the operation of God, who raised him from 
the dead/' It takes no little ingenuity not to perceive a reference 
in the burial here to immersion. If there were nothing said about 
a resurrection in the second clause, Professor Stuart himself wotild 
feel no doubt about the allusion, and certainly here the latter 
clause has no right to unsettle the plain meaning of the first, 
whatever doubts there may be as to its own construction. Try 
the figure by the common meaning of the word |3a;rr/^(j, i. ^., to 
" immerse," and then read " we are buried with him in our immer- 
sion," and who can doubt that the one alludes to the other. In 
fact, if there were a dozen significations all equally current, this 
Avould be enough to show which we should prefer. 

But what is there to disturb this conviction in the latter clause, 
'• wherein also ye are risen with him," and this, if it stood alone 
just thus, would be a plain allusion to the rising up again in the 
waters of baptism ; the connectives *' icherein^ also^'^ fixing the 
sense beyond question. But here Professor Stuart wotdd remark 
that we have not yet read the whole clause, " wherein also ye are 
risen with him through (did) faith of the operation of God who 
hath raised him from the dead.'' Here then it is said the resur- 
rection is declared to be " through faith^"'' and hence it must be 
the spiritual resurrection of the soul^ which is alluded to, not of 
the body in water baptism. Suppose it were so, for a moment, 
what then ? "Why then it must be supposed to follow that there is 
in the term " resurrection," here, no allusion to the mode of bap- 
tism, and then as the resurrection is put as the antithesis to the 
"&wr/aZ" of the first clause, that also must be understood as a 
'* moral hurial," and not a hteral one in water, so that there is here 



II. 12. 399 

no allusion at all to the mode of baptism, and then the language 
of Eomans, vi. 4, can, by being esteemed parallel to it, be also ex- 
plained without supposing any reference to immersion. Such is 
the only process by "which Professor Stuart would explain the allu- 
sion to immersion out of these passages. "An ever-widening spiral 
ergo from the narrow aperture of a single text." Though who does 
not see a want of conclusiveness in every step of this long chain, 
by which to draw immersion away from baptism ? But it is certain 
that the usual rendering of the connectives of the second clause, 
" wherein also^^^ {ev 6 Kal)^ can be set aside, indicates that we are 
raised up as well as buried '' in 'baptism^^'' even if by a mode of 
speaking common with St. Paul, w^e supposed a reference also to 
that spiritual resurrection of which baptism is the symbol. This 
would not disturb the meaning of the first clause which is so clear^ 
or the sense might be regarded as elliptically expressed, and fully 
written out thus: ''Buried with Him in baptism, in which rite also 
ye have been raised up with him symbohcally from the water, even 
as ye were truly raised up from spiritual death, through faith of the 
operation of God," etc. But why should we not regard faith to 
be here represented by a carrying out of the figure as a spiritual 
arm that supports us unseen through the water, and raises us up 
again. Certain it is that we are here expressly said to be raised 
up in laptism^ if we give h u the usual interpretation. 

To obviate this. Professor Stuart introduces a different transla- 
lation, rendering it ^'' with whom also ye had been raised up by 
faith." etc. This makes the iv u refer to Clirist, and not to the 
baptism. This is a possible rendering, but not the natural one. 
The Syriac, which must have great weight in a question of this 
kind, translates the passage, " Ye liave been buried with Ilim by 
baptism, and by it ye have risen with Ilim, while ye believed in 
the power of God who raised Him from the dead." ^lacknight 
renders it ''in which, i. e. baptism, ye also arc raised Avith Him." 
Conybeare gives the sense '''' wherein y Otherwise, indeed, the 
correspondence between the two antithetical clauses of the liguro 
is damaged, the burial being iu the baptism, and the rosurroctiou 



400 EOMANS, VI. 4. 

iu the Scavioiir. In fact, apart from the baptismal question, there 
is not a single reason in favor of this translation, but all are 
against it. 

Suppose, however. Professor Stuart's rendering to be adopted, 
and it were granted that the resurrection is expressly in Christ, by- 
faith alone, and refers not in any shape to baptism, then it will be 
found that the chief ground on which he builds his whole hy- 
pothesis of there being no allusion to immersion, in Eomans, vi. 
4, is cut away. For that ground was that we must suppose a 
perfect antithesis between the burial and the resurrection. But 
by the new translation of Oolossians, ii. 12, it is not so, for accord- 
ing to it, the death is in some way by the means of (ev) the physi- 
cal or literal act of ourselves in baptism, but the resurrection by 
means of (ev) the spiritual work of Christ upon our hearts. This 
is' not to be got rid of by any signification we give to the prepo- 
sition ev, as applied to the burial^ for the noun remains the same, 
literal baptism. But if it be said that the literal act of baptism 
really embraces a moi^al act or vow, subjecting the soul to Christ, 
as well as a physical act, subjecting the body to the water, and 
that it may be in allusion to the moral^ and not the physical act 
of baptism ; still the antithesis would then be incomplete as ever, 
for it would be a moral burial by the choice of the candidate, 
while the resurrection would be a spiritual resurrection by that 
prior act of the Divine mind, which is the cause^ and therefore not 
the antithesis of the vow or moral burial in baptism. The term 
baptism, however, here can not be understood in any such way as 
to exclude the physical act, or have other than primary reference 
to it. 'None can show indeed that there is here reference to any 
thing beside the physical act. Whatever remoteness as to means 
might be grounded upon the preposition ev (as possibly meaning at)^ 
in Colossians, ii. 12, by contrast makes the sense of Romans, vi. 4, 
the stronger, for there instead of ev, we have (Scd, " we are buried 
with him through baptism into death." 

No more complete proof is needed of the utter impropriety of 
Professor Stuart's interpretation of this passage, than the difficult}/ 



OPEN COMMUNION. 401 

which every reader must and does experience in realizing the Pro- 
fessor's meaning in his own mind, even after he has translated it 
after his own fashion. "We have been bm-ied with Christ " hy or at 
baptism." To turn our eyes perforce away from the most obvious 
reference of '' baptism," here, for the sake of a more abstract and 
remote idea, i. e., that at the time of our baptism we made a 
vow to be spiritually dead and buried to sin, seems like a man 
from prejudice shutting his eyes so as not to see immersion. 

ISTothing surely can be more plain, therefore, than the allusion 
here to immersion. This is shown as well by the unanimity of 
ancient, as modern critics. 



APPENDIX E. Page 310. 

THE MISCONCEPTIONS OF OPEN COMMUNION. 

The advocacy of open communion, generally arises from a series 
of misconceptions, which only need to be pointed out to be aban- 
doned. It is commonly supposed that by failing to invite any per- 
son to unite with us in the Lord's Supper, we say in effect that he 
is no Christian. This arises from the ancient error which is the 
basis of Popery, i.e.^ confounding the terms of membership in visible 
churches, and in the invisible church, baptism, and regeneration. 
Sometimes our opponents seem actually to suppose that we do 
not believe, or at least, have some doubt, if persons can be saved 
without baptism — and that we do not administer the Lord's 
Supper where we deny the sufficiency of the baptism on this ac- 
count. 

But in fact, our principles essentially involve the exact opposite 
of this. We never baptize an}^ until after the candidates have 
made a credible profession of Christian faith, the forgiveness of 
sins, and a regenerate heart. It is impossible for us, thoref )ro, to 
suppose that the outward act of bai)tism is essential to the recep- 
tion of these blessings. Infant baptism can only bo immodiatoly 



402 IMISCOXCEPTIOXS IXYOLTED 

useful to the child by an opus operatum^ and must naturally favoi 
the idea of its influencing salvation. But that of adults upon a 
credible profession of faith cuts at the root of any such view. 
Eobert Hall, therefore, in his letter to a clergyman of Cambridge, 
wrote : " Our sentiments upon the baptismal rite exempt us from 
any temptation to lay undue stress upon it. TTe consider it merely 
as the symbol of a Christian profession, while you profess to 
believe it regenerates the partaker and makes him a child of 
God."i 

It is true that in common with all other evangelical Christians, 
we hold that tlie disposition to submit to whatever is clearly and 
deliberately perceived to be the will of God on every subject, is 
essential to saving piety, and, therefore, to our salvation. All 
Christians know that just at the ttirning point of conversion, trifling 
with conscience in little things, may and does produce the most 
fearful eftects on spiritual character. But beyond this which oth- 
ers would admit as cheerfully as themselves, it is from no suspicion 
of the sincere piety of their Pedobaptist brethren that Baptists 
decline to unite with them in the celebration of the eucharist. 
"Were any of these to present themselves and be received as candi- 
dates for baptism by one of our Churclies, yet if any circumstance 
prevented their receiving that ordinance before the next commu- 
nion, they would not participate, simply because our principles of 
membership do not recognize any persons as members of our 
churches until after baptism, although we always recognize their 
Christian character 'before. 

It is an error to suppose the Lord's Supper an ordinance to be 
administered simply on the principle of including all that we sup- 
pose Christ will at least include in His kingdom of glory and no 
others ; to suppose the terms of membership in each true visible 
Church of Christ to be the same precisely as those of the great 
Universal Church which is invisible, whether they unite them- 
selves to any visible Church or not. Yet this is the main pivot of | 
Robert Hall's whole argument. He says, over and again, taking } 

1 Works, voL 4, p. 636. 



IN OPE]^ COMMUITION. 403 

for granted^ indeed, ratlier than attempting to prove it, that tlie Uni- 
versal Oliurcli " differs from a particular assembly of Christians only 
as the whole differs from a part." It might as reasonably be said 
tbat a family differs from a nation " only'^ as a part differs from 
the whole. A nation is a larger body, it is true, and it embraces 
many families, but does it, therefore, follow tbat the constitution 
of the family circle is and ought to be^dentical with that of the 
State, or that every individual or family residing in the State is 
entitled to vote, whether aliens or not, and further that every per- 
son who might be entitled to the privileges of citizenship should, 
therefore, have a right to be considered at all times, and as long as 
he pleased, a member of any family ? 

The terms of membership in the two bodies, though harmonious 
in their general principles, are radically distinct in this respect at 
least, that the Universal Church, is, while on earth, an inmsihle 
body. It is composed of all those who have faith in Christ, 
whether they have professed that faith by joining a Church, or, 
like the dying thief, have not. But some kind of credible profes- 
sion of faith must be necessary to visible Church membership. 
And further, as we do not read the heart, the actual possession of 
faith can not always be requisite to visible membership, since it 
can not be determined. Hence, all visible churches contain some 
members who do not belong to the invisible communion. 

Neander illustrates the distinction, "John describes imimcard 
community, the assemblage of those who stand in communion with 
the Bedeemer, and which embraces the whole development of the 
divine life among mankind; and an outicard community of believ- 
ers, which it is possible for those to join who have no part in the 
former. * * * We find here as in St. Paul's writings, the dis- 
tinction of the msiUe and the invisible Church." ^ 

The visible churches are also independent bodies, just as all tho 
families in a community are independent in their household ar- 
rangements. Hence, it does not follow that because an individual 
is entitled to enjoy tho privileges of a homo in his own family, ho 
1 Planting and Training, book vi. chap. 4, pp. 320, 321. 



404 MISTAKE AS TO 

is, tlierefore, at liberty to claim all the same prerogatives in any- 
other, as he may see fit to demand tliem. So must it ever be, 
measm-abl}^, in well regulated Christian Churches. 

The Lord's Supper is a symbol of this among other things — our 
union with those with whom we celebrate it in xisihle church rela- 
tions. Indeed, all ordinances belong, not to the invisible Church, 
as such, but are committed to the visible Churches of Christ. 

Unbaptized persons are not invited to join with us in the Lord's 
Supper simply because they do not unite with us, in their ideas 
of visible Church membership, that is in regard to ordinances, the 
very subjects committed to Church custody. The articles of 
faith in every Pedobaptist Cliurch, by upholding and requiring in- 
fant baptism do, in fact, the same thing. But this never was meant 
to indicate, and it never can, that all others are not true mem- 
bers of the invisible Church. 

Another mistake often made is, that we are supposed, at least, 
to " unchurch" all other denominations, or say in effect that we do 
not consider them true visible Churches of Christ. But it is one 
of the great advantages of our practice that it delivers us from 
the impossible and vain task of deciding what, in the judgment of 
the great King, are, and what are not true visible Churches. 
We do not profess to invite all that are members of what we be- 
lieve to be such bodies to our communion tables. Those who 
do, have virtually to make out a list, and by excluding some 
denominations, as the Koman Catholics, or Greek Church, and in- 
cluding others, such as Episcopalians, assume a prerogative which 
in His alone '' whose eyes are as a flame of fire," and " who walketh 
m the midst of the seven golden candlesticks." 

But regarding the Lord's Supper as we do, to be an ordinance 
committed in charge to each ijarticular Church, as such, just as 
the Passover was originally committed to each family to cele- 
brate, while all were commanded to keep it, so we only invite those 
to unite with us on such occasions as either are members of our 
particular churches, or who may, in fact, be so considered for 
the time being. A man may be a conscientious and sincerely 



II 



UNCHUECHIXG OTIIEKS. 405 

pious Eoman Catholic, or ISTestorian, or member of the Greek 
Church ; and we shoukl be sorry by any act of ours in refusing 
to unite with bim in the Lord's Supper, to deny that he coukl 
be a Christian, or seem to assert his Church to be so corrupt 
that no good man could belong to it, and only more sorry by unit- 
ing with him to endorse the Eoman Catholic or Universalis t sys- 
tems. There are many matters about which a Church of Christ, 
as such, is not called upon to pronounce any opinion. Where 
a person is baptized upon a credible profession of his personal 
faith, his position is clear. As the member of a body with a con- 
stitution perfectly analogous with every otlier Baptist Church, if 
temporarily sojourning with any of our churches he may consist- 
ently, if all see fit, bo regarded as a member for the time being, 
and as such, receive the Lord's Supper. But without baptism lie 
could not join any Baptist Church. To certify him, therefore, to 
the w^orld as such would be to profess what is not true. But if we 
admitted some without a valid baptism, on the ground of personal 
piety when we declined to receive others, we should thus deny the 
pretensions to godliness of all we declined to receive. We may 
esteem persons as Christians, or some may so regard them, and 
others may not; their conversation or deportment may justly sat- 
isfy individuals, but union with some Christian Church that re- 
quires what we require — a valid baptism as a public profession of 
personal piety is but a proper antecedent to being recognized by us 
in a matter involving church relations. Otherwise, to acconnno- 
date the ceremonial eccentricities of individuals, we must pour con- 
tempt upon the Christian character of millions. 

It is with us in this matter as voting is in relation to citizenship, 
A foreigner might live in this country many years, and make it his 
liome. Ho might pay his share of the taxes, enjoy the ])r()toction 
of its laws, and from an honest preference for its institutions have 
transferred to it the allegiance of his heart and his atl'ections. ])Ut 
if from neglect or mistake lie had not been through the forms of 
naturalization, or any other forms necessary to entitle him to vote, 
and he should present himself at the polls, allliough the t>tlicor 



406 CEEEMOXIAL QUALIFICATIOXS 

might knoTv Mm personally, and respect Ms character and inten- 
tions and be sure that he was better qualified, moralh', than thou- 
sands, it would not be right to permit him to vote, and miglit 
vitiate a whole election. By so doing the only barrier would be 
broken down that prevents the inhabitants of the whole world 
from overthrowing the liberties of this country. In all other 
respects he could enjoy the blessings of its institutions. He 
could travel unmolested where he pleased, be protected from 
injury, engage in any business, be received with esteem and friend- 
sliip according to his real worth and character, but while he ne- 
glected the forms of naturalization he must abstain from voting. 
To enjoy ceremonial ])rivileges there must le ceremonial qualijlca' 
tions. 

It is not necessary to deny that other bodies may be true (though 
irregular) Churches of Christ. For one, the writer of these pages 
would frankly say that the term ''church," sKK/.r/aia^ signifying 
"congregation," or "an assembly, of men," any body regularly 
assembling for the worship of God, and composed of persons making 
a credible profession of Christian piety, may be, he considers, a 
Ciiristian Church, though very irregular and erroneous in its or- 
ganization and modes of government. 

Hence there are Christian Churches of various kinds and degrees 
of irregularity, some in which the world is so mixed up, that they 
can barely be considered Christian Churches at all. Some that 
call themselves Churches, like the Roman Catholic and Greek 
communions, having indeed become so corrupt that they stand like 
old and decayed trees, all dead, except here and there a limb with 
a few scattered leaves on, in which alone vitality lingers ; others, 
again, fresh and green, richly laden with the fruits of a healthful piety. 
It is the duty of each Church to take the 'Rqw Testament for 
its model, and by these means secure the greatest possible fruitful- 
ness. Il^or can any Baptist doubt that the only regular and primi- 
tive way is for churches to be composed only of those who have 
received a true baptism on a credible profession of the Christian 
faith. 



1 



FOE CEREMOKIAL PRIVILEGES. 407 

It will be urged, however, that surely membership in an evan- 
gelical Church of another denomination ought to be esteemed suf- 
ficient. 

We gladly admit that so far as the spiritual qualifications are 
concerned, there are evangelical churches whose care in receiving 
none but the converted is at the present time generally as great 
as our own on the whole. But then it must be borne in mind 
that in not one of these denominations was it so a hundred years 
ago ; and except perhaps among the Congregationalists, this prin- 
ciple is not 710W embodied in their confessions of faith. Only a few 
years ago we knew a gentleman who was a regular communicant 
of an orthodox Congregational Church in New England, under 
one of the most evangelical of their ministers, and who liad been 
for many years, but did not profess, and never liacl professed to 
have undergone any change of heart. He went to the clergyman 
and claimed to be admitted, and was admitted on his baptism in- 
infancy, according to the theory defended by Dr. Stoddard. To 
this day the Presbyterian confession of faith does not render con- 
version necessary to full Church membership. It might at any 
time revert, without violating a letter of its constitution, to the un- 
converted membership and ministry it had before the Tennents 
arose, and common in the National Church of Scotland. 

Our Methodist brethren exhort those who avowedly have no ex- 
perimental evidence of spiritual life to join their classes and come 
forward and partalce of the Lord'^s Supper as a means of grace^ as- 
suring their hearers that they have known many to be regenerated 
at the communion-table. Still so far as our Presbyterian, Congre- 
gational, and Methodist brethren are concerned, as a whole wo 
believe that membership of any of their Churches 7?(??o would bo 
in general as credible an evidence of personal ])iety as avo could 
desire. But this is with them a recent and changed phase of their 
piety, and without the conservative feature of believer's baptism, 
it might all change back again any day. The inllucnce ol" infant 
baptism tends that way all the time, and would uncpiostionahly 
destroy evangelical Church membership, but that, as we may now 



408 COMMUNION BASED ON 

hope, evangelical religion is about to destroy it. But of all tlie 
Pedobaptist sects represented in this country, and their number is 
not small, there is not one that as a denomination has ever main- 
tained, even in theory, a converted Church membership for a hun- 
dred years together, and hardly for fifty years. 

And while we fully feel, and delight to acknowledge as far as 
possible the evangelical character of these denominations at pres- 
ent, we have no right to undertake, by invidious and impracticable 
distinctions, to decide what are not evangehcal Christian churches. 
We simply take the ground that these churches, however spiritual 
or otherwise, are constituted without reference to a valid baptism, 
that is one on a credible profession of personal faith. That they 
are so irfegular^ in this respect, that we should not wish to be united 
with them ecclesiastically, as they would not with us. 

In all cases the rule of communion must be based on the 
visible Church membership of the party invited, and not his own 
spiritual character apart from that. For instance, we are to invite 
a pious Episcopalian to unite with us, it is urged, but are we then 
to invite every member of the Church of England, when it is no- 
torious that while it has produced some of the most excellent 
Christians upon earth, vast multitudes of its communicants know 
nothing of true piety, and half of them are characterized by the 
most intelligent of their own members '' as very visible rogues and 
scoundrels, believing neither in God nor devil." We may doubtless 
find pious members of the Church of Eome, but shall we invite 
them to unite with us, and acknowledge it to be a true and Divine 
Institution on that account? The Presbyterians have decided 
that the Church of Rome is no longer a true Church now ; but that 
it was until the time of the Reformation. In our view, this is an 
unnecessary, unprofitable, and even erroneous decision. What is 
called the Church of Rome is in fact the aggregate of thousands of 
churches, and some may be living bodies, as others are certainly 
dead. The Jesuits' sections were in the gall of bitterness, while 
the Jansenists were probably living branches of the true vine. 
The candlestick of the Church in Eome itself may by the Great 



CHURCH MEMBERSHir. 409 

Head have been removed out of its place, and its light extin- 
guished, hovv^ever many wax tapers may have burned upon its 
altars. Its peoi)le and priests may have been shut up in darkness 
to believe a lie, while the Son of Man was holding Wickliffe as a 
star in his right hand, and walking in the midst of his little 
church at Lutterworth, in Wales, trimming its lamps, and pouring 
oil upon its flame. Yet Wickliffe offered to defend his principles 
at first before the Pope; nor is it possible among Pedobaptist 
Churches to draw the line, for the worst denominations will exhibit 
the most pious individuals occasionally. The corrupt court of 
Louis XI Y., at Versailles, could boast of its Masillon, and the 
Jesuits have with reason extolled the piety of Francis Xavier. 

But to receive every man we esteem an experimental Christian 
without any regard to an evangelical Church-membership and reg- 
ular profession would be, as we have seen, like letting every for- 
eigner vote whom you esteem a worthy and intelligent man, with- 
out any regard to the certificate of citizenship. 

It is a mistake very commonly made, to suppose that Baptists 
are different from other denominations in not inviting all Chris- 
tians, as such, to unite with them on sacramental occasions. This 
is a great error. They do, indeed, differ from them as to baptism, 
but we know of no denomination of Christians who have ever 
esteemed it proper to admit those whom they considered un- 
baptized to their communion table. Bishop White refused the 
communion to an evangelical Quaker. But few of any denomina- 
tion would admit that there coukl be such a thing as a visible 
Christian Chiu'ch, in any sense of the term, without a true ba])- 
tism. It is a question with which the present discussion has noth- 
ing to do ; and it may be admiltod or denied. But certainly coni- 
inon sense suggests that where ritual communion tnkos ])laco in 
respect to one ordinance, it ought in the other. To say that 
Pedobaptists would admit the members of Hai)tist Chui\'iies to 
their communion is nothing, for thoy do not doubt tlie valid- 
ity of such baptism: I^aplists; more than doubt llie validity of 
theirs. Tiie question is, would Pedobaptists admit pious nu'nd>ors 

18 



410 com:«:o]^ i^iistakes. 

of unbaptized bodies to tbeir table ? This tliey can not do, at least 
consistently vritli their standards. 

In the Methodist Book of Discipline, for instance, it is expressly 
enjoined, " Let none bo received into the Church until they have 

* * * 1)6611 haxjtized^'' etc.^ And no person is to be admitted to 
the Lord's Sapper upon principles v^hich would exclude them 
from the Church.'* The Presbyterian Confession of faith declares 
baptism to be a sacrament '-''for tlie soUmn admission of the party 
'baptized into fhe usille Cliurchy^ So all the Congregational Di- 
vines, and so tht symbols of every Keformed Church, and Church 
not reformed. .11 contain the same truth without a single excep- 
tion. Dr. Wall in his history of infant baptism, admits this in 
the fullest termi declaring that "no Church ever gave communion 
to any persons oef^re they were baptized.''* And even Kobert 
Hall fully adm' fiat "the members of the primitive Church con- 
sisted of onh r^ut'' as were baptized." * * * " We are willing 
to go a step further," he proceeds, "and to acknowledge that he 
who, convinced of the divine origin of Christianity by the ministry 
of the Apostles, had refused to be baptized, would at that 2^eriod 
have been justly debarred from receiving the sacramental elements ; 

* * * he would undoubtedly have been repelled as a contuma- 
cious schismatic."^ 

There is one farther misconception that we wish to clear 
away from this question. Many persons are inclined to suppose 
that because our Pedobaptist brethren really 'believe that they 
have been baptized, they are entitled to be treated in regard to 
the communion as though they had been. If that were so in 
regard to this matter, it would have to be carried out into every 
thing. Whoever thought himself baptized would be, and there 
the whole matter would end. If Baptists admitted the validity of 
infant spriukUng as baptism at the communion table, it would be 
difficult f tr them to deny it at the water's edge. The Christian 
world could never believe them sincere in asserting such Baptism 

1 Cb. ii. sec. il 2 Ch. i. sec. 23. ^ Conf. of Faith, eh. xxviii. 1. 

4 Part ii. ch. ii. 5 gee Terms of Communior, part i. sec. iii. 



I 



ROBERT HALL. 411 

invalid if they admitted the sufficiency of every man's own opin- 
ion in the matter. Morally the prejudices of education may make 
it some excuse for not heing baptized, but can not alter the fact ; 
and the question to be discussed is, whether unbaptized per- 
sons, if regenerated, are entitled to unite with Baptist Churches in 
this ordinance, and as members. Mr. Noel states this point with 
clearness : " I believe each person who has been merely sprinkled 
in infancy is unbaptized, because the external act of baptism is 
immersion, and that act is meant to be a profession of repentance 
and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The person sprinkled in in- 
fancy has neither been immersed, nor has he made through his 
reception of the sprinkled water any profession whatever of dis- 
cipleship ; he is, therefore, wholly unbaptized." He then proceeds 
to " advocate the right of such persons to a place at the Lord's 
table, in Baptist Cliurches." Though how it could remain a Bap- 
tist Church if every unbaptized believer had equally a *' right" 
there, he does not explain. Eobert Hall had the consistency to 
give this point up, and admit that his system would destroy all de- 
nomination. 



APPENDIX F. Page 361. 

ROBERT HALL ON THE AMERICAN- WAR. 

** OiSTE evening our conversation turned on the subject of the 
war with America, previously to the acknowledgment of the inde- 
pendence of the United States. Mr. Hall said, * Sir, that war was 
very unpopular, and considered to be very unrighteous, by men of 
true liberty principles. My father, sir, warmly advocated the 
American cause. When I was a little boy, he took mo to tlio 
school of Mr. Kyland, at Northampton, the father of Dr. Ryland 
of Bristol. This Mr. Ryland was very eccentric, and a violent 
partisan of the Americans. It was in the hottest period of the 
war, sir, and many persons were very indignant at the conduct of 



412 EOBEET HALL OX THE 

the English government. That war, sir, was considered as a cru- 
sade against the Hberty of the subject and the rights of man. 
The first night we arrived at Northampton from Arnsby, sir, the 
two old gentlemen (my father and Mr. Eyland) talked over 
American politics until they both became heated on the same side 
of the question. At length Mr. Rylaud burst forth in this man- 
oer: 'Brother Hall, I will tell you what I would do if I were 
General Washington.' 'Well,' said my father, Svh at would you 
do V ' Why, Brother Hall, if I were General Washington, 1 
would summon all the American officers ; they should form a circle 
around me, and I would address them, and we would offer a liba- 
tion in our own blood, and I would order one of them to bring a 
lancet and a punch-bowl, and he should bleed us all one by one 
into this punch-bowl, and I would be the first to bare my arm, 
and when the puncli-bowl was full, and we had all been bled, I 
w^ould call upon every man to consecrate himself to the work by 
dipping his sword into the bowl and entering into a solemn cov- 
enant engagement by oath one to another, and we Avould swear 
by Him that sits upon the throne, and liveth forever and ever, 
that we would never sheath our swords while there was an English 
soldier in arms remaining in America; and that is what I would 
do, brother Hall.' 

"Mr. Hall said to me, 'Only conceive, sir, my situation, a poor 
little boy that had never been out of his mother's chimney-corner 
before, sir, sitting by these two old gentlemen, and hearing this 
conversation about blood. Sir, I trembled at the idea of being left 
with such a bloody-minded master. Why, sir, I began to think he 
would no more mind bleeding me than he would kihing a fly. I 
quite expected to be bled, sir." ^ 

He who, after reading the above, peruses the following para- 
graph from Robert Hall's celebrated sermon on ''Sentiments proper 
for the Present Crisis," can, I think, have no doubt that much 
of the fire and spirit of the latter was derived from the scene he 
had thuswitnessed : 

^ Eobert Hall's works, vol. iv. pp. 48, 49. Harper. 



ii 



AMERICAN WAR. 413 

" Enjoy that repose, illustrious immortals. Your mantle fell 
when you ascended, and thousands, inflamed with your spirit, and 
impatient to tread in your steps, are ready to swear by Him that 
sitteth upon the throne, and liveth forever and ever, they will 
protect freedom in her last asylum, and never desert that cause 
which you sustained by your labors and cemented with your 
blood. And Thou, sole Ruler among the children of men, to 
whom the shields of the earth belong, gird on Thy sword Thou 
most Mighty ; go forth with our hosts in the day of battle," etc.^ 

1 YoL i. p. 110. 



INDEX. 



■^ PAGE 

Abrahamic Covenant, no proof of In- 
fant Baptism, ....... 90 

Administration of Ordinances, com- 
mitted to Churches, 297 

Administrators of Baptism, . . . .103 
^neas, Sylvius, his account of the 

Waldenses, 28 

Aggressive bodies, churches are, . . 307 

Aicoviog, its meaning, 121 

Albigenses, considered Baptists by 

Limborch, 27 

Alexander, Dr. Archibald, . . .66, 118 

Allegiance to Christ, 212 

Alliances, Evangelical, 305 

Altar, but one to a Church, .... 306 
American, Christianity, distinctive fea- 
tures of, 18, 60, 64 

Independence, origin of, ... 354 
self-government, origin of, . . . 352 

Analysis of soils, 378 

of principles, 379 

Ancient opinions on Communion, . . 306 
Anthon, Dr., on Immersion, . . . .138 
Antichrist, treatise on, quoted, ... 22 
Apocrypha, its use of BaTrrt^co, . . . 196 

Apostles, seldom baptize, 299 

Apostolic Constitutions, 117 

Arnold of Brescia, history of, ... 24 
opposed to Church and State, . . 25 

to Infant Baptism, 26 

Attacks on Evangelical Religion, re- 
cent, 308 

Augusti on Immersion, 173 

on Infant Baptism, 114 

on Proselyte Baptism, .... 98 

on the Catechumens, 114 

Augustine, in favor of force in religion, 20 

on singing, 342 

Authority, of the Church, 318 

B 

Backus, his liistory quoted, . . . .'iH, 51 
Uainl, Dr., his Religion in Ainciica 

quoted, .... 09 



PAGE 

Baltimore, Lord, and Liberty of Con- 
science, 40, 42 

Basil's, address to the Catechumen.'^, 110 

Baptism, a burial, 170, 396 

Clinic, 206 

contains a Confession of Faith, . 215 

effects of, 226 

figurative allusions to, .... 166 

its administrators, 163 

its pledges, 221 

of a Universalist, 219 

of cups, etc., 193 

of the eunuch, 166 

of the jailor, 163 

of the three thousand, . . , .162 
why in rivers, 164 

Baptisms of the New Testament, cir- 
cumstances, 159 

Baptismal Regeneration, in Melville's 

Sermons, 76 

in the Episcopal Service, . . 75, 332 

in Wesley's writings, 76 

the Lutheran Confession, in re- 
gard to, 74 

Baptist, Church Government, . . . 345 

influence in Virginia, 51 

Church membership, voluntary 

and converted, 346 

theory of Church membership, 

251, 251,256 
views of Infant Dedication, . . 86 
views, approaches to, by other de- 
nominations, 380 

Baptists, and American Independence, 355 

and Bible societies, 3'J(» 

and Bible translations, .... 3J5 
and Mis.sionary movements, . .319 
jmd political liberty, . . . 317, 361 
and rights of conscience, . . . 36-2 

and the nible, 31S. .'{r.l 

(Mily, tlirir principles 375 

t'XcoMunuiiicateil liy the Urown- 

ists '.288 

in .VintMica, why not niixoil anii- 
niunion, . '-290 



416 



IXDEX. 



PAGE 

Baptists in favor of full religious liber- 
ty, 33, 35, 54, 55, 50 

" in theory," Dr. BushneU, . . 248 
increase of, in Europe, .... 128 

in the United States, 129 

persecuted in Tsew England, . . 53 
persecuted in Virginia, .... 50 

their chief danger, 376 

Ban-Tt^cj, always equivalent to dip, 

144,175,199 
always involves immersion, . .175 

in Luke, xi. 38, 167 

in the Apocrypha, 16G 

in the Septuagint, 195 

its classic use, always, .... 177 

its ordinary use, 141, 150 

its root and primary sense, . . . 149 

Liddell & Scott, 149, 177 

New Testament use of, ... . 183 

Robinson on, 149, 182 

Stuart on, 149 

with dative and prepositions, 152, 390 

BuTTroj, used figuratively, 176 

Believer's baptism, its due promi- 
nence, 38-1 

Bethesda, Pool of, its size, .... 159 

Bible and freedom, 362 

and the Church, 309 

contains the Constitution of the 

Church, 328 

its efi'ects, 313 

its power, 322 

Societies and the Baptists, . . . 326 
to be ''reformed" on Baptism, . 271 
Biblical translations and the Baptists, 325 
Bibliolatry, charge of, considered, . 327 
Bingham, his radical mistake, . . . 100 
Breach of trust, involved in mixed 

communion, 290 

Bro\ATiists, opposed to full religious 

liberty, 31, 34 

Bucket, the command to dip, . . . 143 
Bunsen, in favor of a mixed Church 

membership as to Baptism, . . 16 
his defense of Infant Baptism, . 270 

on Confirmation, 273 

on Irenaeus, . 120 

on Origen, 123 

on Tertullian, 121 

On a Reconstructive Reformation, 278 
on " reforming" Biblical baptism, 271 
on the American Baptists, . . . 260 

on the Catechumens, 115 

on the " fictions" of Pedobaptism; 88 
on the Priesthood of all Chris- 
tians, : , . . . 3.S7 



PAGE 

Bunsen, on the rise of Infant Bap- 
tism, 101, 104 

Bunyan on Communion, 288 

Burden of proof, in regard to Ba-rt^cu, 184 

Burial, Baptism a, 396 

Buried by Baptism, 171 

Bushnell', Dr., on Infant Baptism, . . 246 
his dangerous tendencies, . . . 261 
his description of the Baptist 

theoiy, 251 

his history of Theories, .... 259 
his ''Pedobaptist Theory," . .252 
his settlement in the ministry, . 249 
on Household Baptisms, .... 249 
on Organic connection, . . 254, 262 

c 

Calvin, on Religious Liberty, ... 31 
Campbell, Dr. George, on Immersion, 139 

on Matt. iii. 11 158 

Canterbury, the Archbishop of, finds 

Infant Baptism unscriptural, . 282 

Carey, AVilliam, and the Bible, . . 379 

and Xavier compared, .... 324 

Catechumens all unbaptized, . . . 109 

Augusti on, 114 

Basil's address to, 110 

Bunsen on, 115 

Dr. Henry of New York on, . .112 
in the Greek and Roman churches, 116 
in the 4th and 5th centuries, . .113 

Neander on, 116 

often children, 110 

Catechumenical system opposed to 

Infant Baptism, 108 

Centuriators of Magdeburg, .... 28 
Chalmers, his argument for Infant 

Baptism, 117 

in favor of Church and State, . . 33 
Change of feeling toward Baptists, . 16 
Changes among Episcopalians. ... 62 
among Roman Catholics, ... 61 
Chauncey, Dr., and Religious Liberty, 52 
China, Religious Liberty in, . . . .59 

Chinese Insurrection, 321 

Chrysostom, 101 

Church, a Physician, 309 • 

and State opposed to freedom, . 18 
and State united by Constantine, 20 

and the Bible, 309 

authority, true views, ... . 318 

Government, Baptist, 345 

History, as to Infant Baptism, . 99 

invisible, and visible, 403 

Neander's idea of, .... 108 
of England, and'Dissenter.<, . 363 



INDEX. 



417 



PAGE 

Church, the origin of American liberty, 357 

the, what is it ? 236 

universal, visible, ...... 302 

Churches, aggressive bodies, . . . 307 
Baptist, their converted member- 
ship, 346 

Divine institutions, 239 

guardians of Ordinances, . . . 296 

their powder, 352 

Christ, the Captain of Salvation, . .212 
Christian Nurture, Dr. Bushnell's, . 246 

Christians, all priests, 336 

Christianity, its view of human na- 
ture, 269 

Circumcision and Infant Baptism, . 90 
Circumstances attending Baptisms, . 159 

Classic use of BaTrri^co, 177 

Clinic Baptism, 206 

Coleridge, adult Baptism " more scrip- 
tural," 102 

his defense of Infant Baptism, . 234 
his " Discretionary Power," . .235 
on Circumcision and Baptism, . 91 
on Household Baptism, .... 94 
on " The Church," what is it ? . 236 
on the intolerable view of God 
implied by Infant Baptism, . 78, 245 
Collection of works on Baptism, . . 15 
Command, the meaning of a, how as- 
certained, 396 

to Baptize — a command to im- 
merse, 141,200 

Common Lav/^, of American Christian- 
ity, 17 

on Ratification, 275 

Communion, ancient views of, . . . 306 

Bunsen's view of, 285 

mixed, History of, 288 

inexpedient, 294 

its consequences, .... 292 

misconceptions of, ... 401 
not practiced by Pcdobap- 
tists, ...... 289, 293 

produces indifference, to 

ordinances 310 

unwise, 285 

occasional, 304 

R. Hall on, 287, 309, 301 

Coinus, Milton's, quoted, 143 

Concodcd principles stated, .... 15 
Confession of the reformed Churches 

on Baptis-mal Regeiieralion, . 71 

('(infirmation, Bunsenon, ~'73 

Conrirriiiug, a nullity, '-^75 

Uongrcgntional Ciiurclies and a Cou- 

vertcd Membership, .... 08 
18 --5^ 



PAGE 

Congregational singmg, 341 

Congregationalists, decrease of Infants 

Baptized among, 131 

supported by law, 53 

Congress, Contmental and Religious 

Liberty, .54 

Provincial, of Massachusetts, . . 54 
Conscience, its rights the foundation 

of all rights, 362 

Constantino, unites Church and State, 20 
Constitution of churches, changed by 

Infant Baptism, 237 

of the United States, amended in 
favor of Religious Liberty, . . 58 
Contradictory opinions of the Con- 
gregationalists as to Infant Bap- 
tism, 77, 247 

Controversy, points of, narrowed 

down, 17 

Controverted principles stated, . . . 141 
Converted Church Membership, . . 60 
a Baptist principle, . 64 
Congregational view of, 08 
Knapp's view of, . . 65 
Methodist view of, . 55 
Presbyterian views of, 66 
Conybeare on Acts xvi. 33, ... . 164 

on Rom. vi. 3, . . . . . . . .170 

Cornelius not Baptized by Peter, - . 292 

Creed, Baptismal, 214 

Crisis, spiritual, usually sensible, . . 270 
Custody of ordinances committed to 

churches, 296 



Danger of infants dying unbaptized 

taught by Infant Baptism, 74, 78, 245 
Dangerous tendencies of Dr. Bush- 
nell's theory, 262 

Daniel's window open, 228 

Dative, after Banr^w, 390 

its nature and force, 391 

KUhncr on, 391 

Stuart on, 390 

Decrease of Infant Bajitisni aniont,' 

the Congregationalists, 128, 131 

among Metlu)dists, 130 

among the rrosl)yt(M-ians, . . . 133 

m United Slates 136 

Dip, its various meanings, .... 1 13 
a huckc't, meaning of the coiu- 

niand M3 

a perfect (Mi'uvalent for lldn-rf^w, 199 
Dioiiysius, llelicurnassus, quoted,. . 140 



418 



INDEX, 



PAGE 

"Discretionary power" claimed for 

the Church, by Coleridge, . . .235 

Dissenters, English, their position, . 383 

Donatists, merge into the Waldenses, 21 

the advocates of Religious Liberty, 20 

E 

Ecclesiasticus, xxxiv. 25, .... 198 

Eddystone Light-House, 231 

Edward's theory of Church Member- 
ship, 251 

Effects of Baptism, 226 

of Mixed Communion, .... 292 

of the Bible on nations, . . . .313 

eis, and Professor Stuart's rule, 153, 166, 393 

€/f, 166 

Ev, its force in New^ Testament, . 156, 393 
England, progress of Religious Lib- 
erty in, 58 

Episcopal Church and Baptismal Re- 
generation, 75 

Church, its Constitutions, . . . 240 
Episcopalians, changes among, . . 62 
Ernesti's rules of Interpretation, 146, 148 
Established Church in Virginia, . . 49 
Eunuch, his baptism, 166 

F 

Faith and symbols, 308 

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — a creed, 215 

the, Faith in, 214 

Featley, Dr., his " Dippers Dipped," . 16 
Figurative allusions to Baptism, . . 166 
Fogs lingering on Pedobaptist Church- 
es, 17 

" Follow me," 212 

Fourteen hundred volumes on Bap- 
tism, 15 

Free government and religion, . . . 357 
French Infidel and Baptism, .... 209 

Revolution, the fruits, .... 360 

G 

Germany, and Religious Liberty, . . 59 
Greek Church, Catechumens of, . .116 

H 

Half Covenant System, 260 

Hall, Robert, and Dr. Ryland, . 361, 409 

on Communion, . . . 287, 300, 301 
Hellenistic, use of B(ZKriC;w, . . . .185 

Henricians, 24 

Henry, Dr., New York, on Catechu- 
mens, 112 

VIII. Oil Religious Liberty, ... 31 
Hernias, on Baptism, 172 I 



PAGE 

Historical view of Immersion, . . .171 
History of Religious Liberty, ... 20 
Hodge, Dr., his Way of Life Baptist, 388 

on Circumcision and Baptism, . 92 
Holland, Baptist Church in, ... . 288 

Holy Ghost, the, faith in, 217 

Hopkins, Dr., 247 

Household Baptisms, 93 

Hughes, W^m., and the Bible Society, 326 

Archbishop, on Religious Liberty, 42 
Hundred years ago, state of opinions 

on Religious Liberty, .... 48 



Ide, Dr., quoted, 

Illustration of a sailor commanded to 

dip a bucket, 143, 

Illustration of Ratifying Infant Bap- 
tism, 

Immersion always required by Ban- 
rt(a), 

Bishop Smith on, 

commanded, illustration, . . . 

commanded in Baptism, . . . . 

corroborated by circumstances, . 
by the prepositions, . . . 

Dr. Arthur on, 

Dr. Campbell (George) on, . . . 

in the Swale, 

historical view of, 

pools for, 

prevailed till 13th century, . . . 

Professor Stuart on, 

required by John, iii. 23, ... . 

Acts, viii. 28, 

1 Cor. X. 2, c . . . 

1 Peter, iii. 20, 21, 

Hebrews, x. 22, 

the Primitive Baptism, .... 

time occupied by, 

Importance of Baptism, 

" In" and " Into," their force, . . . 

Increase of the Baptists, 

Independents opposed to full liberty 

of conscience, 

Indifference, the result of mixed com- 
munion, 

Infant Baptism, accounted for, . . . 

and the Catechumenical system, 

and the Irish Church, . . . • . 

and TJnitarianism, 

Augustine on, 

Bunsen's theory of, 

causes inextricable confusion, 

produces Puseyism, 



334 

200 

275 

175 
137 

200 

141 

159 

152 

138 

139 

161 

171 

159 

173 

140 

165 

165 

166 

167 

168. 

13' 

161 

202 

162 

129 

32 

310 
125 
108 

nil 

334^ 
124j 
270| 

81 1 

S3 



I 



INDEX. 



419 



PAGE 

Infant Baptism, Chalmers on, . . .117 
changes the Constitution of a 

Church, 237 

Church History against it, . . . 99 
Coleridge's defense of, ... . 234 

Cyprian on, 124 

decrease of . . 128 

Dr. Alexander on, 118 

Dr. Bushnell's view of, ... . 246 
the entering wedge of Popery, . 84 
in the 4th and 5th centuries, . .112 

injurious, 233 

Irenseus on, 119 

its rise traced, 117 

" North British Review" on, 87,89, 233 
not general till 6th century, . .114 
not supported by circumcision, . 90 
by Household Baptism, .... 93 

by Matt. xix. 14, 95 

Proselyte Baptism, 98 

Origen on, 122 

rare at the rise of the Donatists, . 23 

statistics of, 387 

subverts Evangelical Religion, . 368 
supposes an intolerable view of 

God, 245 

Tertullian on, 121 

the support of tradition, . . . .316 
unknown till middle of 3d cen- 
tury, 101 

unknown to Justin Martyr, . . .119 

unscriptural, 80, 89, 282 

Infant Communion, 125 

Dedication 86 

Infidel and Baptism, 209 

Interpreter and translator, their re- 
spective duties, 395 

Intolerable view of God, 245 

Introduction, 13 

Iren;x3us on Infant Baptism, . . . .119 

Bunsen, etc., on, 120 

Neander on, 119 

Irish Church and Infant Baptism, . .111 



Jacobi on Household Baptisms, 


. 93 


on Matt. xix. 14, 


. 96 


on 1 Cor. vii. 14, 


. 96 


on Proselyte Baptism, . . 


. 98 


Jefferson and the Baptists, . . 


. 350 


Jerusalem, its pools of water, . 


. 159 


Jordan, as a place of Baptism, . 


. 164 


Judith, xii. 7, 


. 196 


Ju'lson, Dr., and the Bible, . . 


. 320 


Juslification by Faitli, .... 


. 330 



PAGE 

Justm Martyr ignorant of Infant Bap- 
tism, 119 

on Baptism, 172 

Justinian's law as to Catechumens, . Ill 

K 

Keith, George, 45 

Kingdom of Christ, 350 

Napoleon on, 350 

Kitto's Biblical Cyclopaedia, .... 33 
Knapp on a Converted Membership, . 64 
Knox, John, opposed to Religious 

Liberty, 33 

L 

Law, Common, on Ratification, . . 275 

Liberty of Conscience, Bancroft on, . 39 

Baptists in favor of 1560, . 33 

Brownists on, 32 

Calvin's views of, .... 31 

Helwisse on, 36 

Henry VIII. on, .... 31 
in New England before the 

Revolution, 46 

John Smith in favor of, . . 35 
John Knox opposed to, . . 33 
John Robinson opposed to,. 34 
Lord Baltimore on, . . 40, 42 
Luther's views on, ... 31 
Melancthon and all the Re- 
formers on, 31 

Presbyterian views, . . 32, 57 
Roger Williams on ... 37 

William Penn on 42 

Liberty, political, and the Baptists, . 347 

Religious. (See Religious Liberty.) 
Liddeli & Scott's Lexicon, . . 149, 177 
Light of the world. Christians are 

light-houses, 229 

Limborch considers Waldcnses and 

Albigcnscs Baptists, .... 27 
Lord's Supper, .... 205, 303, 401 

Aot5££v, Trench on, 108,195 

Luke's omission of £1/, 158 

Luther on Faith in Lifants, .... 79 
opposed to liberty of conscience, 31 



M 



Magdeburg, Centuriators of, .... 28 

Majority and its rights, 354 

Melville on Baptismal Regeneration, 75 
Mennonites and Religious Liberty, . 30 
Mercersburg School, 63 



420 



I]S^DEX. 



PAGE 

Merle D'Aubigne on the Priesthood 

of all Christians, 336 

Methodists and Converted Church 

Membership, 65 

decrease of Infant Baptism among, 130 

Milton's Comus quoted, 143 

Minorities and reserved rights, . . . 354 
Misconceptions, the cause of open 

communion, 401 

Missions and the Bible, 319 

Roman Catholic and Baptist, . . 323 

Missionary Boards, 343 

Murdoch, Dr., on Arnold, as a Baptist, 20 
Mutual approaches of Baptists and 

Pedobaptists, 380 

IS 

Naaman, 193 

Nations, their sources of power, . . 34« 
Neander, on Arnold of Brescia, . . 24 

on 1 Cor. vii. 14, 96 

on Cyprian, 124 

on Household Baptisms, .... 94 
on Invisible and Visible Churches, 403 

on Irenasus, 1.19 

on Origen, 122 

on Tertullian, 121 

on the Catechumens, 116 

on the origin of the Waldenses, . 22 
on the Priesthood of all Chris- 
tians, 336 

the Progress of his views on In- 
fant Baptism, ... ... 102 

Baptism, idea of the Church, . . 108 
testimony to the Donatists and re- 
ligious freedom, 20 

Nevin, Dr., 248 

New England and Religious Liberty, 46 

Unitarianism, 335 

Noah's Flood and Baptism, .... 167 
"North British Review," on the un- 
scripturalness of Infant Bap- 
tism, 80, 82, 89, 282 

on 1 Cor. vii. 14, 97 

reforming the interpretation of 

the Bible 284 

the grounds of defense of Infant 

Baptism, 282 

North-west territory made free from 

all restrictions on conscience, . 56 
Nullity cannot be confirmed, . . . 275 



Occasional Communion, 304 

One altar to a Church, 306 



PAGS 

Origen on Infant Baptism, . . . .122 

Bunsen on, 123 

Neander on, 122 

Origin of Infant Baptism, 125 



Partial immersion and Prof. Robin- 
son, 182 

Patrick Henry, 50, 354 

Pedobaptist Churches not Mixed Com- 
munion, 289 

Penn, William, on Religious Freedom, 42 

Petrobrussians, 24 

Philippi, Conybeare on, 164 

Phraseology, Campbell on, . . . .391 

Physician, the Church a, 309 

Physician of souls, 381 

Pilgrim Fathers and Liberty of Con- 
science, 34 

Pledges in Baptism, 221 

reciprocal in Baptism, .... 223 
Pliny and Religious Liberty, ... 20 
Political Liberty and the Baptists, . 347 

Pond, Dr., his mistake, 146 

Pools in Jerusalem, 159, 160 

Position of various parties, .... 382 

Positive precepts, 203 

Potter, M. de, on the Waldenses, . . 27 

Prepositions, their force, 152 

Dr. Robinson on, 157 

and Ban-ri^oj, 152, 390 

Presbyterian statistics of Baptism, . 387 
view of Infant Baptism, . . 77 
Presbyterians- and a Converted Mem- 
bership, 66 

decrease of infants Baptized among, 

133 

and Religious Liberty, . . 31, 51, 57 

Press, the, in modern ]Missions, . . 3'25 

Presume, its meaning, 265 

Presumptions of Infant Baptism, . . 256 
Presumptively, a Christian, .... 205 

Priesthood of all Christians 336 

Bunsen on the, 337 

Merle D'Aubigne on, 336 

Neander on, 336 

Principles, always held in common, . 312 

conceded, 15 

still controverted, 141 

Progress of Converted Membership in 

Europe, 71 

Proselyte Bantism, 9S 

Puseyism, cause of, its su^'cess, . . 04 
iTifQTit Ba:t-:ni, i^- Cilailel. ... S3 



. 



I]&^DEX. 



421 



PAGE 

Ratification of a Nullity impossible, . 275 
Reciprocal pledges in Baptism, . . 223 
Reconstructive Reformation propos- 
ed, 279 

Reformers generally opposed to Liber- 
ty of Conscience, 31 

Regeneration, Baptismal. (See Bap- 
tismal Regeneration). 

Reinerius, Sacclio, 22 

Religion, the basis of Free Govern- 
ment, 357 

Religious Liberty among Mohammed- 
ans, 50 

asserted by Presbyterians, ... 57 
discussed in Continental Congress, 54 
early developments of, .... 20 

in Canada, 58 

in China, 59 

in England, 58 

in Massachusetts Legislature, . 55 
in Massachusetts Provincial Con- 
gress, 54 

in the North-west Territory, . . 56 

in Virginia, 49 

on the Continent, 59 

opposed by Augustine, .... 20 
the Constitution of the United 
States amended to favor it, . . 58 

the Mennonites on, 30 

the Waldenses on, 28 

Reserved Rights, 354 

Revolutions unsuccessful without Re- 
ligion, 358 

Rights of Conscience, the foundation 

of all liberty, 363 

Robinson, John, opposed to full Liber- 
ty of Conscience, 34 

Robinson, Dr., on the Pools of Jerusa- 
lem, 159 

Robinson's Lexicon on BaTrri^w, 

149, 182, 183 
Roman Catholic, Defense of Infant 

Baptism, 315 

Catechumens, 116 

Missions and Protestant, . 323 
change among, 61 

S 

Sabbath School System, 344 

S'iccho, Rchierius, 22 

Sa'^crdotalism, supported by Infant 

Baptism, 80 

Saciainonts vitalized by Faitli, ... 71 
Salvation by Grace, 329 



if PAGE 

Self-government, 352 

in Massachusetts, 352 

in Rhode Island, 353 

Septuagint, ase of Ba-TTt^co, .... 195 
Silence of Church History on Infant 

Baptism, 99 

Singing, Jewish, 341 

Sirach, xxxi. 25, 198 

Smith, Bishop, of Kentucky, on Im- 
mersion, 137 

Smyth, John, on Liberty of Consci- 
ence, 1511, 35 

Socrates, a disciple of, \ 213 

Son, faith in the, 215 

Sponsors, unscriptural, 68 

Statistics of Infant Baptism, . . .387 
Stoddard, his views of Ordinances, . 261 

Strength of Nations 348 

Stuart, on ft? after Batrri^ro, .... 153 

on Matt. iii. 6, 156, 390 

on Immersion, 140 

on the New Testament use of 

Banri^rjj, 183 

on the Prepositions after Butt- 

ri^oj, 153, 390 

on Proselyte Baptism, . . . . • 99 

on Rom. vi. 4, 396 

on the force of the Dative, . . . 391 
Historical view of Baptism, . .171 

Sufficiency of Scripture, 312 

Infant Baptism, 315 

Summary of this work, 366 

Sylvester, Pope, alluded to by the 

Waldenses and Neander, . . 22 

Symbols and Faith, 308 

Synecdoche, and Dr. Robinson, . . 182 



Teachings of Baptism, . . 
Torment, Gilbert, .... 
Tertullian, as to Infant Baptism 

Bunsen on, 

Neander on, 

Time occupied by Immersion 
Tobacco tax, c(lcct of, . . . 
Toc(iuevillo, M. do, on the Bible, 
Tracts for the Times, quoted. 
Tradition, supported by Infant 

tisni, 

Translator and Interpreter, th 

spectivo duties, , . . 
Treatise on Antichrist, . . . 
Tr(Micli on the sense o['\tn>cii', 
Tr()i)iciil us(» of words, . . . 
Turkey and l\(digious Liberty, 
Tyler, Dr., on Dr. Buslmcll, . 



209 

121 
121 
121 
161 
354 
314 
316 



316 
39:) 

ir.s 

176 
59 



217,1 



422 



IJ^DEX. 



IT # 

PAGE 

Unconverted Church Membership, its 

effects, 3^^ 

Unitarians of New Enghmcl, .... 68 
Unitarianism caused by Infant Bap- 
tism, ^^^ 

Universal Church, visible, .... 302 
Universalist Baptism, 218 



. 354 

. 49 
. 51 
. 403 
. 302 



Virginia, Baptists»in, . . . 

religious persecution in, . . 

abolish persecution, . . • 
Visible and Invisible Churches, 

Church Universal, . . . 

W 

Waldenses, and Religious Liberty, . 
Limborch's description of, as Bap- 
tists 2' 



28 



PAGE 

Waldenses, M. de Potter on, ... 27 

spring from the Donatists, ... 21 

Wall, Dr., his radical mistake, . . .109 

on Basil, '^[^ 

Water in Jerusalem, 15'J 

much, John, iii. 23, 105 

" Way of Life," Baptist, 388 

Wesley and Baptismal Regeneration, 76 
John, and Baptismal Regenera- 
tion, 65 

Wilberforce, his sons, 308 

Williams, R.oger, account of, ... 37 

Bancroft on, 39 

the first Legislator introducing 
Liberty of Conscience, .... 38 
Wiseman, Dr., on Missions, . . . .323 
Words, have generally various signifi- 
cations, 146 

literal meaning of, 175 

figurative, do., 176 

X 
Xavier and Carey, 324 



INDEX TO TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE AND APOCRYPHA, 

ILLUSTRATED IX THIS VOLUME. 



PAGE 

Gen. iv. 26, 227 

2 Kings, V. 14, 195 

Isaiah, xlv. 5, 227 

Judith, xii. 7, 196 

Ecclesiasticus, xxxiv. 25, 198 



Matt. lii. 6, 
Matt. iii. 6, . 
Matt. iii. 11, . 
Matt. xix. 14, 



156 

393 

394 

95 



Mark, i. 5, 156 

Mark, i. 5, 394 

Mark, i. 9, 1^5 

Mark, vii. 2, 3, 190 

Mark, vii. 4, 8, 189, 192 

Mark, x. 13-16o . • 95 

Luke, iii. 16, • . . 395 

Luke, xi. 38, 187 



Luke, xii. 50, 
Luke, viii. 15-17, 



PAGE 

. 168 
. 95 



165 



John, iii. 23, 

Acts, i. 5, ^'95 

Acts, viii. 38, ^^^ 

Acts, xi. 16, 395 

Acts, xvi. 33, illustrated, 164 

Rom.vi. 4, 169 

1 Cor. vii. 14, 96 

1 Cor. X. 2, 16S 

1 Cor. xi. 18, 34, 303 

1 Cor. XV. 29, 224 

170, 396 



Col. ii. 12, its true importance, 

Heb. ix. 10, 

Heb. X. 22, 



1 Peter, ii. 5, 9, . . 
1 Peter, iii. 20, 21, 



191 
371 



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and the ashes of buried controversy are in every instance left undisturbed. In fine, the book is emi- 
nently a Christian one, and higher praise than this we know not how to give. — Xorth Am. Review. 

We hope that every Christian family will have a copy of this work. The History of the American 
Baptist 3Iission5 are fully, accurately, and elegantly sketched, and judiciously arranged ; which is aU 
that was required to make one of the most interesting books of the age. — Jlich. Ch. Herald. 

AVe have rarely read a work of so unabating and thrilling interest as the one before us. It is writ- 
ten in a clear and graceful style, and abounds in incidents of moral courage and Christian heroism 
to which every thing in the range of fiction seems tame and insipid. — Westovi Lit. Jlessenger. 

A copy should be in every family. — Phil. Ch. Chronicle. 

"We welcome with imfeigned pleasure this new contribution to the literature of Christian missions. 
For its plan and execution, and for the interest which it gathers around subjects in themselves deeply 
interesting and truly sublime, it will be attractive no less to the readers of general literature, than 
those who approve and love the work of missions. — Baptist Jli-ssionary JIagazine. 

Every page would convey to the mind of one who is an utter stranger to our missions, internal 
evidence of trutlifulness. We trust that the volume will be widely read, and increase the fruits of 
missionary zeal, an hundred fold. — Watchman and Reflector. Tt 



THE CHURCH MEMBER'S MANUAL 

Of Ecclesiastical Principles, Doctrines, and Discipline. By the Rev. Wil* 
L.IAM Crowell. Introduction by li. J. Ripley, D. D. Second edition, revised and 
improved. 12mo, cloth, 75 cts. 

We have looked through this book with no little interest. It is written with perspicuity, candor, and 
ability. It contains much to which all denominations, and especially Orthodox Cougregationalists, 
would heartily subsciihe. — Fur itan Recorder, 

We welcome this Manual with unusual satisfaction. In a brief compass we have a development 
of Baptist principles as to church organization, and church order, with a comprehensive view of the 
doctrines of the gospel as held by Baptists, and an exhibit of various usages which obtain, more or 
less, iu the denomination. We regard the work as one of great practical value, and desire for it a 
wide circulation in our churches. — iV. Y. Recorder. 

We would be happy to see a copy of this work in every Baptist family in our state. — Zion's Adv. 

As a Manual of ecclesiastical principles, doctrine, and discipline, presenting a systematic view of 
the structure, policy, doctrines, and practices of Christian churches, as taiight in tlie Scriptures, as a 
book for old and young, it will be found very interesting and instructive, and as a book of reference, 
one of great value. We wish all our young brethren would study it. — Bap. Register. 

This has now, by common consent, obtained a place among our permanent literature as a denom- 
ination. It is a book that should find a wide circulation in the west. — Ch. Messenger. 

The tirst edition was well received. The author has been over every chapter and line, and presented 
us with a new and tlioroughly revised edition. It should be introduced into all the families, and 
among all the members of our churches. Its influence, in explaining and enforcing our polity, as 
a denomination, would be most instructive and salutary. — Phil. Ch. Chronicle. 

The main positions are defended with a vigor and clearness of argument that reflect great credit 
upon the bearing and tact of the author. There is an air of practical good sense, and a candor and 
good feeling towards other denominations, which give the book additional value, and will, undoubted- 
ly, enhance its usefulness. — Biblical Repository. 

Hardly any question can be raised with regard to the nature, powers, rights, and duties of a church, 
to the appointment, character, ordination, and authority of its otRcers, to the articles of its belief and 
the nature and proofs of its positive institutions, to its government, discipline, and usages, which is 
not here met by a distinct, intelligent, and satisfactory answer. —Southern Ba^dist. 

It bears the marks of attention, study, and great care in the arrangement and discussion of the 
numerous topics embraced in it, and contains much that will interest evangelical readers of every 
church. — rhil, Ch. Observer, 

THE CHUKCH MEMBER'S HAND-BOOK; a Plain Guide to the 
Doctrines and Practice of Baptist Churches. By IlEV. VVlLLlAM Crowell. Fifth 
thousand. 18ino, cloth, 38 cts. 

CoxTENTS. — The Ground Work of Ileligion ; Christian Truth : Frame Work of Religion ; Chris- 
tian Churches i Memorials of Religion ; Christian Ordinances: Symbols of Religion ; Christiatt 
Sacraments: Privileges of Religion ; Church Discipline : Life of Religion; Christian Love, etc. 

We have never met with a book of this size that contained so full niid complete a synopsis of the 
doctrines and practice of the Baptist, or any other church, as this. Just such a book as is neodcil by 
every young church member. — Ch. Secretary. 

It is concise, clear, and comprehensive ; and, as an exposition of ecclesiastical principles and prac- 
tice, is worthy of stndy by all young meml)er3 of our churches. We hope it m:iy be widely circu- 
lated, and that tl>e youthful thousands of our Israel may become familiar with its pages.— Watch- 
man and Rcjlector, 

This is just the book wanted in all i)art3 of our country. It contains u condcnsod but coniplcto 
epitome of all those things wliich come up in practice, and o'n which churchi-s and ministers are fre- 
quently called to act. — ire.s/trn WatclDiian, 

A brief, plain guide to j^oung cliurch members. We wisli every one of thin class might luive the 
" Hand Hook." Ignorance of the doctrine of the IJihle and the laws of Christ's house is ti>e disgrace 
of too many, both of the young and old, and through it blight and dishonor often couio upon U»o 
Visil)le church of God. — Mich. Ch. Herald. 

This is decidedly the best treatine that has ever conu" uniK'r our notice. — Iiiifian Advoratc. ^ 

Ita doctrinal views wotdd tend to stability, «H its practical .suggcHlioim would to spiritual lile. Itl 
hints and rules on rights, duties, dis(i|)linp, hnsiness, and order, if <Iuly observed, would eontiihut* 
greatly to the peace, purity, and elliciL-ncy jf our churches. —A. J'. Recorder, Uu 



WORKS ON BAPTISM. 

THE MODE AND SUBJECTS OF BAPTISM. By Milo P. Jev/^ 

ETT, A. M., late Minister of tJie Presbyterian Church, and Professor in i\larietta College. 

Twelfth thousand. Cloth, 25 cts. 

*,* There coutinues a steady demand for this valuable and increasingly popular book. Its cheap- 
ness puts it Avitliin the reach of all, and giving, as it does, a simple, yet concise account of the " Prog- 
ress in Error, and Discovery of the Truth," of a prominent Presbyterian clergyman and distinguished 
Professor in " Marietta College," it is just the book to put into the hands of any one seeking after 
truth on the subject of Baptism. Multitudes who, owing to prejudice, early education, etc., have 
been perplexed and in doubt on the subject, will have occasion to be grateful for tlie perusal of this 
work in connection witli the Bible, as the means of enlightening and settling their miuds in the truth. 

Rev. J. JR. Graves, editor of the Tennefisee Baptist, in a recent number of his i>aper, says, " Who will 
write the history of one little Jeicett on JBajitism ? Hundreds in our land have been converted to the 
trutli by perusing that book. Remington, an able :Nrethodist preaclier, read that work ; it resulted 
in his conversion — he wrote 7iis, ' reasons,' and they converted another preacher, and the pebble tlius 
thrown by Bro. Jewett in the sea of mind, produced a wave which produced another, and th'is in 
long succession they will travel on, each producing its successor until they break on the shores of 
eternity. Is the object not a commendable one ? It is pouring oil upon the unresting wave of reli- 
gious mind, lashed by angry discussions. Such books read in solitude with one's Bible and his God, 
will hush the tempest of his own soul to rest." 

CHRISTIAN BAPTISM ; with many Quotations from Pedobaptist au- 
thors. By Adoniram Judson, D. D. New edition, revised and enlarged. Cloth, 
18mo, 25 cts. 

*,* Several large editions, in pamphlet form, were many years since published in this country in 
rapid succession ; and although frequent calls have been made for copies, it has been for a long time 
" out of print." The vencrabTc author, during his late visit to this country, took occasion to thorough- 
ly revise and enlarge the work, and it is now, for the first time, published in regular book form.^ It 
will doubtless be sought for and read with interest by all, deemed, as it is, by those capable of judging, 
one of the best works on the subject of Baptism extant. 

The Christian Bevieiv says, " It is a clear, calm, and convincing view of the futility of the distin- 
guishing points of Pedobaptism, and a rational and scriptural defence of the baptism of persons of 
suitable age and qualifications, and in the manner prescribed in the New Testament. 

ESSAY ON CHRISTIAN BAPTISM. By the Rev. Baptist W. Noel. 

16mo, cloth, CO cts. 

BIBLE BAPTISM. A beautiful Steel Engraving. 1 

In the centre of this splendid work of art, (nine by twelve inches in size,) is represented a Church^ 
a Baptismal Scene, &e., and in the margin are arranged all the texts of Scripture, found in the New 
Testament, alluding to the subject of Baptism, which not only renders it very convenient for refer- 
ence, but as a whole is truly an elegant ornamental picture for the parlor. Printed on thick fine 
paper for framing. Price, 25 cts. 



\ 



CHRISTIANITY DEMONSTRATED : in four distinct and indepefi 
ent Series of Proofs. With an explanation of the Types and Prophecies concerning tli^ 
Messiah. By Rev. Harvey Newcomb. 12mo, cloth, 75 cts. 

BUCK'S RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE ; a Treatise in which the N 
lure. Evidences, and Advantages are considered. By REV. C. Buck, London. 12ino| 
cloth, 50. 

ANTIOCH; or. Increase of Moral Power in the Church of Christ. B^ 
P. Church, D. D. With an Essay, by Baron Stow, D. D. 18mo, cloth, 50 cts. 

MY PROGRESS IN ERROR AND RECOVERY TO TRUTH; 

or, a Tour through Universal ism, Unitarian ism, and Scepticism. Second thousand. 
ISrno, cloth, 63 cts. Ss 



MIALL'S WOEKS, 



FOOTSTEPS OE OUR EOEEFATHERS 5 what they Suffered and 

what they Sought. Descnbmg Localities and portraymg Personages and Events con- 
spicuous in tile Struggles for Religious Liberty. Ey James G. xMiall author of " Me- 
morials of Early Christianity," etc. Containing thirty-six fine Illustrations. 12mo, l',00. 
zefoTZ'^'fl entertaining work It is full of strong points. The reader soon catches the fire Ld 
zeal of tao.e .tcrUng meu whoa, we liave so long admired, and ere he is aware becomes so deeply en- 
hited in their cause tlxat he hnds it difficult to lay aside the book till finished. - Ch. Parlor Macj 

tc^l^^VT'v '''''';'''\''^ ^' "^f !;*^ ^'''^ self-sacrifice in the work of God. It portrays the charac- 
ter the decd.s tne sutlermgs, and the success of those heroic non-conformists who stood up for the 
truth against tyranny. It is a hook worthy of a large sale. - Zion^s Herald. 

A work absorbingly interesting, and very instructive. ^Western Lit. Magazine. 

The title of tins book attracted our attentioii ; its contents have held us fast to its padres to the very 
clo e. Is story is of pnnc.plcs and sullerings with which every American who prizes his birtluT'hf 
and would know how it has been secured, should be familiar. It embraces graphic sketches of lie U-' 
ities and scenes, of personages and events, illustrative of tJie grand stru-le for religious liberty It is 
foscmatmg in style, and ix^iable for substance. It is full of antiquarian lore, and abounds inVharn- 
mg local descriptions. JMost earnestly do we recommend it. - Watchman and Bcflector. 

The events narrated and scenes described by the author give us interesting and impressive views 
of the great sacruices made by the noble sufferers for the priceless boon of spiritual freedom, which 
American citizens claim as their birthright. - Ch. Observer. 

This volume is devoted to biographical notices of tliose noble minds who made the grand discov, 
en s of civil and rehg.ous hberty in England, and who counted not their lives dear, so tliat the Bibl^ 
and the freedom of conscience should descend upon their children's children. The anecdotes of these 
men and their times are full of interest, and are drawn from the most authentic soured -Xa/l'lS 

wTit U A^!;f,,''f '"^'"'"f ^°f '' "^^ ^? '^^"' '''' ''''^'' '' ^°^«P^"ed to finish if he once begins it. 
WbS:S:^"ir^:;^.;oS^r Itl-.eptuspcrf.ctly encLmea 

MEMORIALS OF E AELY CHRISTIANITY ; Presenting, in a graphic 
compact, and popular Form, Memorable Events of Early Ecclesiastical History etc Bv 
James G Miall, author of " Footsteps of our Forefothers,- etc. With numerous 
elegant Illustrations. 12ino, cloth, 1,00. 
x^ This, like the "Footsteps of our Forefathers," will be found a work of uncommon interest. 

ThliVtrnldn trntf/T *^",' ^l""^^' ^^^^^^^ «- '^-^^^^^ ^-ve reprinted in quite handsome stvle. 
Theie a.e p am truths plainly told m this volume about ancient Christianity and tlie practices of-fho 

ti^ i:::':f "^' ''"" "'"' "^ ^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^'-^^''^^'^ -^^^ ^^^^'^ ^--* -^^om ii 

A work of no ordinary value as a faithful exponent of early church history, and we can most cheer- 
fully comn.end itto all. Every Sabbath school should be supplied with copies of ill critia^^ 
I\Tr Miall is a Congregational minister in England, and a popular writer of unusual power. He 
, ';" /;7;'- "^ f-f - ^^ -eation, and hasgiven us pictures of eariy Christianity which have tl o 
cauMu of hfe and reality We regard the volume as one of unusual interest and vahie, and our read- 
. cr« are assured that its glowing pages will excite their admiration. _ .Y. Y. liccordcr. 

Th\^ is an extremely interesting work, embodying classic and ecclesiastic lore, and calculated to do 

, Avery successful nttcmpt to ;.o/9vZ«n-.-c the history of the church during the first tin-eo centuries 
i he msuZA. of extended research arc offered to the general reader in a style of m,ro;mm,u uTfcrc^i 
xiie mass of readers know far too little on church history. - Wafchman and licjlector. 

We have in this volume, embodied in n lucid nnd nttmctivo form, some of the most important facts 
_ cariy ecclesiastical history, in illustration of the original purity nnd power of Christian faith. It 
18 a work of labor, nnd labor very successfully applied. - rurilan licvordvr. 

A volume of thrilling interest. It takes the reader throucrh a verv importnnt period of soenlnr mid 
'oeel..«,„stieal history. We nve irJui to sco this work. It ennnof f ,;i ,>r d..ing poo 1. - b'". - •. / </ 



HYMN BOOKS FOR THE YESTilY. 



1 



THE SOCIAL PSALMIST ; a Selection of Hymns for Conference Meet- 
ings and Family Devotion. By Baron Stow and S. F. Smith. 18mo, sheep, 
25 cts. 
This selection has been in preparation nearly five years, during which time it lias been subjected 

to repeated examinations and careful revision. The object in its preparation has been to fun.ish a 

selection of choice hymns for the vestry and the family circle, of moderate size, and at trifling exi)ense, 

exactly suited to the various stages and conditions of the conference, and other devotional meetiiigs 

usmilly held in the conference room, as well as in family worship. 
The work forms an admirable companion to the rsalmist, and we hope will be widely used in con^ 

ncction wiQi it. — aV. Y. Recorder. 

\ charmin- collection it is indeed, and many of the hymns are those familiar to the Christnni, and 

peculiarly dear to his heart. It is not only well suited for conference and family worship, but w.)uld 

make an excellent supplement to the Psalmist. - N. Y. Bap. Reg. 

The Social Psalmist is a good compilation, and we wish it abundant bmccqss. - Religious Herald. 
The preparation of this work was undertaken by the right hands. We doubt not the work wiU be 

popular and its use coextensive with that of the Psalmist. - Mich. Ch. Herald. 
The standard hymns of the Christian church are the most fit to be enshrined in the memory of tho 

devout, as helps of their worship and their piety. Their familiarity, instead of being an objection to 

them, is their highest praise. We commend the work to the ministry and laity ot the denonnnation. 

— Southern Baptist. 
It is printed on good paper, and strongly bound in sheep, and is afforded at the very low price of 

25 cents per copy, and 2,50 per dozen. 

THE CHRISTIAN MELODIST ; a new CoUection of Hymns for So- 
cial Religious Worship. By Rev. Joseph Banvard. With a choice Selec- 
tion OF Music, adapted to the Hymns. ]8nio, sheep, 37i cts. 

The work contains GOO hymns, and «ach hymn has the name of f "f PP^^Pf *^!"^,^ ,P^^,f '^'' ^^^ 
notes of these tunes, occupying more than sixty pages, arc inserted at the endoj the volume. 

There is a copious variety of hymns, adapted to all the regular and fe occasional meetings of the 
church, printed in large, open type, so as to be easily read. Price 37 1-2 cents. 4,00 per dozen. 

F>.n,. ihP nor Daniel Sharp B.B.: "I take pleasure in saying, that I consider the « Christian 
MdoTst ' a Valuable wrf it 'contains original hymns which are beautiful, and ^ell-known byrans 
« a to ChriJLrs will never be uninteresting. The collection is a very great improvement on hymn 
bols of the ct.ss to Which it belongs. I consider the tunes which are added as highly increasing the 
excellence of the publication." 

Similar testimonials have also been received from other pastors in Boston vjz.: Rev. Messrs. R. H. 
Neale, P. Church, N. Colver, Geo. W. Bosworth, Wm. Howe, P. Stow, and INI. Sanford. 

From Rev R Turnhulh D. D., Pastor 1st Baptist Ch. Hartford, Ct. : « Generally, the hymns are| 
J:Z:^^^^^ and'well fitted toexpress theemotions ot' a Chr^tia^^ [rhymrboTd 
of the tunes at the end of the volume is a great improvement. Indeed it is the best hymn book 
the vestry which I have ever seen." I 

From. S. H. Cone, D. D., Pastor of 1st Baptist CI,. Kew Tori: : "It afTords me pleasure to com- 
JZt as one of the most copious and judiciously arranged hymn '"'f ^ I '-- j'™^; t restore to 
troductior. of appropriate tunes is a valuable addition, and will have a tendency 1 1 ust, to « '»'■' » 
our Aure",es the primitive practice of • speaking in psalms and hymns and sp.ntual songs, in «h,ch 
the congregation may make melody to the Lord." 

.-%— sr<;;rs^:^rK^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 

Davis J. T. Seely, D. Dunbar, C. Morton, and J. L. Hodge, Brooklyn. 

T^rL r P Id. D D Pastor of 1st Baptist Ch. Sprrn g field, Mass. : « An excellent collection 
oZZj.' ^^:\^^^o^ being adapted to the sanctuary ^^^^j:::^:^^^ 
While all will find it a profitable help in the prayer meeting and m ^.^^^^"^^^^ ^^^ ."^^'^^^^^^^^^ ^Tor 
ticularly desirable to those churches who do not wish a more expensive book for the Lord s day, 
prefer one suited to both public and social worship." 

' ^ The above works are both admirably adapted to conference and other devotional meeUngs. ana 
aiso for the family circle, and at family worship, etc. /* r\ -v ' * ,-^ 

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